20 Words OneShots
by Amela333
Summary: Words 1-20 and Bonus Word 21 now COMPLETE! *For CCIMH12's 20 Word Challenge*
1. DAWN

**Disclaimer:** Don't own, don't own...

**A/N: **For CCIMH12's 20 Words contest! Please forgive me if this entry sucks :D. I've been reading the others and they're SO. GOOD.!!

All right, here we go...

**First word**_**:** DAWN_

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I was sitting on the edge of my cot, kicking dismally at the cold stone wall next to me. My diary lay open next to me with a pencil resting in its seam. There was no candle in my room, and obviously no windows; there was no source of light by which to write. The vampires had all turned into their coffins for the day and I had returned to my cell, hoping to update my diary. With Harkat being grilled by the Princes, my journal was the only friend I had. But there was no way for me to write in it if I couldn't see what I was doing. I might have half-vampire eyes, but that didn't mean I could write in the dark.

Mr. Crepsley had warned me not to wander around Vampire Mountain without someone who was familiar with the halls, and so I was confined to my room with nothing to do. I kicked the wall again, wishing there was at least a match or something that would give me just a tad of light, but there wasn't. I lay down miserably, making a mental note to ask Seba for a candle when he awoke the next night.

I shut my eyes and tried to fall asleep, even though I knew it wouldn't work. I couldn't sleep when I was tired, how was I supposed to sleep when I was wide awake? After several minutes I gave up. I swung my legs off the side of my cot and sprung to my feet, pacing around the room. I was tired of being contained in Vampire Mountain; it was a cave of eternal darkness. I hadn't seen the sun in weeks, and it was killing me. When I was a human, I used to love to wake up early and watch the dawn break. It was as though the night had wiped away any problems faced during the day, and when the sun rose, it allowed you to look at things from a different perspective. I had told Mr. Crepsley this once, but he only sniffed with contempt. "One will have the same problems during the day as in the night. In fact, more, because if one happens to be a vampire, they will be burning to a crisp." That was the closest Mr. Crepsley got to humor. But I guess he was right; what good did vampires, who couldn't survive in sunlight and lived for centuries, have for the dawn?

Whether it was my faraway thoughts or the obsessive pacing I didn't know, but a new attitude suddenly washed over me. I wouldn't get lost in the halls, I didn't need a guide. I knew how to get to all the main halls from my cell, and from those I knew how to get to the entrance of the mountain. Maybe it would be guarded and I wound't be let out, but it was a chance I was willing to take to watch the sun rise.

I silently cracked my door open and slipped out into the tunnel, pushing the door shut behind me. I lightly jogged down the hall, careful not to kick any stones of knock into anything that would make a sound and wake any sleeping vampires. After several minutes, my confidence seemed to slip from when I had left my room. I started wondering if I was going in the right direction. Of course I was, I walked this tunnel with Mr. Crepsley every day, I knew where I was going. But did I? Did it always take this long to get to the Hall of Khledon Lurt? Wasn't there a turn behind me that I missed; maybe I should go back? Something kept me moving forwards, straight through the tunnel, taking no turns or stops. I realized that if I had been going in the right direction to reach the Hall of Khledon Lurt, I would have arrived in it several minutes ago. But still I moved on. Something was telling me that this was the way to go. I wasn't worried about getting lost - after all, I _was _just going straight.

Twenty minutes later, I heard something that both startled and puzzled me from around a bend in the tunnel. It was Mr. Crepsley's voice. At first, I started to jog to meet up with him, but after a few feet I stopped in my tracks - if he was talking, it was because he was talking _to _someone. I listened closely for a voice to reply, and sure enough, several seconds one did. It was Arra Sails.

"...glad you remembered," she was saying, and her voice was much more gentle than it had been when I first met her.

"I am as well," Mr. Crepsley said. "Though it would be hard to forget. There are not many vampires who come to the same spot every morning."

"I don't know why," Arra answered, and I became a little braver and got close enough that I could hear them crystal-clearly.

"I suppose it has something to do with the fear of burning," Mr. Crepsley said dryly, and Arra laughed. I could tell by the way their voices carried back to me that they were facing forwards and wouldn't see me if I peaked around the corner.

"As long as you don't hang around too long, it won't hurt you," said Arra. "Even if it does, it's worth it."

I stretched my neck out to peer at them, and had to blink in the sudden golden light. The tunnel came to a very sudden end - not into a wall, but right out the side of the mountain to the outdoors. Mr. Crepsley and Arra were sitting side-by-side, backs to me, with their feet dangling off the cliff the abrupt stop in the tunnel made. With very few mountainside trees, they had a perfect view of the orange, glowing sun as it rose up into the sky.

"Dawn is a beautiful thing," Arra said wistfully. "I wish everyone would take the time to appreciate it."

I smiled to myself and fell back into the tunnel and out of sight. Maybe I had missed the first glimpse of the sun as it peeked over the trees this morning, but I had seen something better - I wasn't the only vampire who still enjoyed the little things in life.

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Thanks for reading...review and I'll love you forever! Word two, _BRILLIANCE, _hopefully coming soon!


	2. BRILLIANCE

**Disclaimer: **See chapter one

**A/N: **Two in a night, not bad for me! Hope you all like this one!

_**Second word:** BRILLIANCE_

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If you were to ask Larten Crepsley what irritated him the most, this would be it. It would not be half as bad if he didn't see - or rather, hear - it coming from a country away, but he did. As he stood on the rooftop of a tall, brick building, his red cape pulled tightly around his shoulders to shield him from the piercing cold, he knew it wouldn't be long now. The sun had set an hour ago, but the city beneath him was starting to buzz with a new vigor; he supposed this was what humans referred to as "Night life". Ha. If they thought night life was staying up during the dark hours, getting wasted, and partying in a noisy club then they didn't know the first thing about the life of the nighttime. Give them a night as a vampire and strobe lights and shots would seem like child's play.

Larten winced, not because a sudden wind made the back of his neck prickle, but because he could hear it now. First the heavy breathing, then a sniffle. After that, the smell of coffee with too much sugar, and then...

"Prepare to die, creature of the night," a poorly-disguised voice hissed. A stake-resembling, pointy object pressed in between Larten's shoulder-blades as he groaned audibly.

"Charna's guts, Gavner," he snapped, whipping around and knocking what turned out to be a carrot out of his friend's hands. "How many bloody times are you going to try that?"

Gavner grinned and slapped him on the back. "Lighten up, Geezer," he chuckled. "Just trying to have some fun."

"It is aggravating," Larten grumbled.

"_You _are aggravating," Gavner retorted, mocking Larten's voice. He smiled again, and Larten had to roll his eyes to keep himself from smiling back. "Someday it's going to be a real vampire hunter, and you'll be wishing it was me," Gavner said, turning and starting off across the rooftop.

Larten fell into step beside him. "If it were a vampire hunter behind me, they would not be breathing like an elephant," he said. "And they would not smell so strongly of coffee. You reek."

"I wouldn't talk if I were you. You smell like you've been bathing in the sewers," Gavner answered, and Larten sniffed at his arm critically.

He made a face. "You are right," he nodded. "I will wash up in my hotel room before -."

"No time," Gavner stopped him. "I made a reservation for ten o'clock, and the clock across the city said nine thirty when I left to flit here.

Gavner and Larten were in a large city on General duties. A vampire named Nurtuck Goodferd was here on an initiation mission to become a General himself and Gavner and Larten had been sent to secretly observe him. So far he had done wonderfully, and so they had agreed to take a night off and eat at a restaurant near their hotel, which would be new experience for both of them. Arra, who was in a nearby town on another assignment, would be joining them, and Larten did not want to smell when he saw his mate for the first time in several weeks.

"Tell you what," Gavner said, "I discovered something the other night that I think will be just what you need to solve your odor problem. It's called cologne. It's a liquid you spray on. Human men wear it to impress girls. It smells good, like...I don't know, a waterfall or something."

Larten raised his eyebrows cynically. He didn't find it likely that a human-intended product would mask his stench, nor did he think Arra would be particularly impressed if he smelled like a waterfall - whatever a waterfall smelled like anyway.

"You have nothing to lose, stinky," Gavner shrugged.

Larten sighed. "You are right," he said. "If you know where to get this cologne then I suppose it cannot hurt."

"No, it can't," Gavner agreed. "It's nice. Really. Anyway, I don't think Arra could care less if you smell like a goat, but you can't go into an eatery smelling like that, you'll make the other patrons vomit."

Several minutes later, the vampires stepped through a heavy door and into a drugstore. Both being unable to read the signs, they began walking the aisles looking for a spray bottle containing the cologne. Larten had no idea what it would look like, and so he followed Gavner's lead.

"Here it is!" Gavner said after barely a minute, pulling a large, blue bottle off a shelf.

Larten looked at it down his nose, frowning. "You are sure about this, Gavner?" he asked suspiciously. "Something about this does not seem right."

"'Course I'm sure," Gavner said confidently. "Come on, we need to hurry. I'll help you put it on outside."

"Very well," Larten bristled. "Let us purchase it and leave, then."

Once they had paid for the bottle, they hurried outside and Gavner unscrewed the cap.

"I thought it sprayed," Larten said quizzically.

"It does," Gavner said distractedly, gesturing at the spray top he had chucked into a trash bin. "But it would take forever to spray on enough to cover that smell. Just pour some onto a handkerchief and rub it into your skin."

Larten sighed but did as Gavner suggested and took out his handkerchief. Before he dumped the liquid onto it, he gave it a sniff.

"Disgusting," he spat, pulling his face away. "It smells like poison."

"In the bottle it might, but look at the picture, it smells like the mountains when you put it on," Gavner said, turning the container one hundred eighty degrees so Larten could see. Sure enough, the image colored on the front showed a snow-topped mountain raised above a flowery field from out of a quaint, cottage window.

"I swear to the vampire gods, Gavner, if I end up smelling like turpentine..." Larten growled, finally pouring out the strongly-scented fluid.

"Mountain breeze, my old friend, I guarantee it" Gavner said. "And hurry, it's nearly ten."

As the so-called mountain-breeze-in-a-bottle touched the skin on Larten's neck, it immediately sent a cool tingle all over his body. He couldn't tell just yet if it was a good tingle, like the tingle he got when Arra kissed him, or a bad tingle, like when a cockroach became stuck in his trousers. He didn't really care, all he knew was that it still smelled foul. He had protested enough for one night though, and so he pushed this out of his mind and continued applying until he had covered his neck, face, arms, and lower back with the solution.

"Done," Gavner said, sniffing the air. He paused for a second, then smiled. "You don't smell like sewers any more," he said optimistically.

"Yes, I now smell like a skunk that has been poisoned to death," Larten grunted, tucking the remainder of the bottle into his cloak as they started off again to the restaurant just across the street.

If Gavner responded, he didn't hear it. His skin was starting to sting and itch; smelling suddenly became the least of his worries.

Gavner held the door open for him when they reached the restaurant and Larten, scratching at his arms, stepped in, unaware that his mate was standing right in front of him. When Gavner greeted her Larten at last looked up, and the discomfort temporarily left his mind as he embraced and kissed her. They waited, his arm around her waist, while Gavner went to ask about their reservation, and when he returned with a host, they followed him into the dining area. After menus had been laid on the table and the host had left, Arra pulled a chair away from the table to have a seat on. But before she sat, she paused and looked around, her nose crinkled.

"What's that smell?" she asked, and Larten's stomach clenched. "It stinks."

As she turned her back to sit, Larten shot Gavner a furious look. The stinging had now been replaced by a violent burning. He tried as hard as he could to ignore it, engaging distractedly in a conversation with Arra about her mission while Gavner ordered them wine, which Larten was looking forward to more and more by the second. After the waiter left, talk turned to his and Gavner's assignment.

"It's going well, we're very impressed with him," Gavner was saying. "This was a bit of a challenging initiation, you know, and he's handling it like an expert. He's very..."

Larten was no longer listening. He was instead rolling up his sleeves to get a better look at his throbbing skin, certain it would burst into flames at any moment. He barely noticed when a wine glass was placed in front of him, because he was started to feel nauseous. A chilling sweat was pouring out of him now, and he was starting to shake. It took him several seconds to realize that Arra was talking to him, her voice full of concern.

"What's wrong?" she asked, taking his hand and lifting it up to her eyes. "And why the hell are you red and bumpy?"

He looked down at his flesh and his eyes popped out of his head. He had broken out into a bright rash, and some places where he had been scratching were starting to bleed. Slowly raising his head to look up at his third dinner companion, his voice came out in a furious growl. "Gavner Purl!" As Gavner stared at Larten, transfixed with horror, his hands clapped to his mouth.

"What's going on?" Arra asked, looking back-and-forth from the men on either side of her. She examined Larten's hand more closely, snatching up a glass of water and pouring some onto him, which, thankfully, gave some relief. "And why do you smell like that?" She used a napkin to put some water on his face while he reached a trembling hand into his cloak and pulled out the blue bottle. Slamming it furiously down on the table, he spat, "Gavner and his stupid cologne is what happened to me!"

Arra tore her eyes off of him for a moment to look at the bottle. Her brow furrowed. "I don't understand what this has to do with it."

"That God-forsaken venom is what has done this to me," Larten said. Gavner, his face still covered, looked frozen with fear.

Arra stared at the bottle for a second, still seeming confused, and then, like a blow to the head, realization dawned on her.

"You...you told him to put _this _on?" she asked, her voice cracking in disbelief, mouth dropping open.

"Of course I did," Gavner said defensively. "You don't have to read to know that cologne comes in a spray bottle."

"You IDIOT Gavner!" she cried, shoving him in the shoulder and sending him sprawling out of his chair. "That isn't cologne, you moron! It's window washer! No wonder he's turned into a raspberry!"

Larten rounded on Gavner, pounding his fist so hard against the table that his wine glass tumbled off and shattered. "WINDOW WASHER? YOU MADE ME PUT A BLOODY CLEANING CHEMICAL ON MY SKIN?"

"You didn't see the clean window in the picture?" Arra asked incredulously.

"I...I thought we were supposed to be looking at the mountains in the background," Gavner said sheepishly as Larten roared in fury, making half of the restaurant stare over at their table. "I thought it was mountain breeze..."

Larten gave his friend one last contemptuous glare before rushing to the restroom to cleanse his body of the blasted stuff.

"Brilliant, Gavner," he heard Arra say sarcastically as he hurried away. "Just brilliant."

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Gotta love friends like that XD!!! I just realized with horror as I proofread through this that at the moment, I sniffle, breath loudly (both because of a stuffy nose due to allergies), and because I'm taking allergy medicine that makes me tired, I'm drinking so much coffee to stay awake that I'm starting to smell like it. So I am Gavner. Oh God...(not that I don't love Gavner and all, but... :P)

So...anyway! I'd love to hear what you all think, so please review! Thanks for reading!


	3. LIGHT

**Disclaimer: **Guess what? I'm not putting a disclaimer on future chapters anymore (ooooh, I am SUCH a rebel teen :P)! For the last time in this story, I. don't. own. it.

**A/N: **Since I love Gavner so dearly, I think he needs some redemption from the last chapter (yeah, it was definitely not his finest hour), so I decided to write this one with him and Liz as the pairing, which I've never done before, so bear with me =)

**Third Word: **_LIGHT_

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How many years had it been since Gavner had seen the light of day? He had no idea of the actual number, but the answer was: too many. Some vampires - well, maybe only Vancha March - seemed to get some sort of rebellious satisfaction from walking around in the sunlight, letting their skin sizzle and peel before they returned to safety. That was crazy. Some others, like Arra Sails, enjoyed watching the sun rise in the morning, but scurried to the comfort of the darkness before it could damage their sensitive skin. That was a waste of time. And then, of course, there were the majority of the vampires, who were content to be creatures of the night for however many centuries they would live. Gavner used to be one of them, mostly because he never really gave it much thought. It was a fact of life that he couldn't walk around during the day, so why would he worry about it? But things had changed when he met Liz. Though she would make her best effort to stay up with him all night while he was visiting, she had obligations during the day, like work, that she couldn't ignore. She was always up during the day, and he longed to spend that time with her. He knew he couldn't be with her for all, or even most, of his life. She was a human (and wanted to stay like that), and humans died in a cruelly short amount of time. He felt like precious moments of their already limited relationship were being lost because of his one stupid shortcoming. It wasn't fair to him, and it certainly wasn't fair to Liz.

Gavner was sitting on his bed, knees hugged to his chest. He had been having a good, long think about this, and tonight - correction, toDAY - was the day he was going for it. He could stand an hour of light for Liz.

He could hear her down in the kitchen, brewing a pot of tea and eating breakfast. It smelled like pancakes. If he had had doubts before, the pancakes just erased them. He climbed out of bed, stepped into a pair of brown slippers, and started downstairs.

"Gavner?" Liz said curiously as he appeared in the kitchen doorway grinning from ear to ear. She was wrapped in a blue bathrobe, sitting at the table, pouring syrup over her meal. A book was propped open next to her, and a mug of coffee was still steaming in her left hand. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," he said happily, helping himself to pancakes before sitting next to her. "I decided to stay up with you for a bit."

She looked at him suspiciously, then glanced out the window. "What about the sun?" she asked, her tone delicate, as if she thought he had forgotten and she might embarrass him.

"What about it?" he said. "I'm inside, it can't hurt me too much." She stared at him, unsureness and concern flooding her eyes. "Really," he said, smiling and taking her free hand. "I promise."

After a second, she smiled back. "Okay then," she said, and handed him a knife and fork. "Want some syrup?"

"Sure!" said Gavner enthusiastically. "So," he started to dress his pancakes. "What are you reading?"

"Actually, _Dracula_," Liz said.

"Really," Gavner said, chuckling. "Did I ever tell you that one of the vampire princes inspired that book?"

"No way!" she said, shutting the book to look at the cheesy vampire on the cover. "It's not very accurate."

"I guess Bram Stoker had to sensationalize it," he shrugged. "Although according to Paris Skyle, he spent a very drunken night playing poker with Stoker and couldn't quite remember everything he said. Who knows, maybe Sire Paris was banking on the fact that if he told him that he could suck his blood and turn him into a vampire that Stoker'd let him win."

Liz shook her head and laughed. "Where do you think he got the turning-into-a-bat thing?"

Gavner had just wolfed down a whole pancake in one bite and so it took him a second before he could answer. "I suppose it's because vampires are friendly with bats. Though Bram Stoker may have caught sight of my friend Larten in his cape. Sometime it blows out behind him like an absurd pair of wings and he looks like a bloody bat." He grinned and added jokingly, "A very ugly, old, red bat." Gavner smiled in satisfaction as he made a mental note to tell Larten that he had mentioned him to Liz.

Liz smiled and slapped him playfully on the elbow. "Speaking of which, you look a little red yourself," she said, pointing at his face.

"Mm," Gavner mumbled through a mouth full of his last pancake. "Feel kind of warm. I'm gonna take a look."

He wiped the short beard and mustache around his mouth with a napkin and went to the foyer, where a small mirror sat above a table decorated with bright flowers. Gavner had been around too long to look in a mirror regularly - he probably hadn't seen his reflection in five or six decades. It was set at Liz's height, and so at first he couldn't even see his chin in it. Lifting it off the hook on the wall, he held it up to his face. What he saw almost made him shout. Yes, he was a little flushed, but that was the least of his worries. He reached a trembling hand up and traced the scars that covered his once-handsome face. There were nearly a half dozen long, jagged ones, and at least ten fleshy depressions in his cheeks and forehead from miscellaneous gouges he had acquired over the years. His hair, once thick and full, was now missing chunks where it had been burned during his trials so long ago. Circles of purple surrounded his dark eyes, making him look like he had gaping holes where his eye sockets should have been. Dumbfounded and horrified, he stared blankly at himself for several long, painful seconds. Gavner wasn't a vain person, vampires were too wise for vanity, but he found himself shocked by the drastic change in his appearance. He hadn't aged much in forty years, but he looked worn and damaged and - he couldn't think of a better word - terrible. If he came across someone who looked himself on the street, he would have thought they had jumped out of a horror movie. It was terrifying. Finally, his shoulders slumped and he replaced the mirror of the wall.

He didn't say anything to Liz as he dragged his feet through the kitchen and to the stairs.

"Gavner? Where are you going?" she called after him. He heard her chair skidding on the floor as she got up to follow him, but he didn't turn around.

"Going to bed," he mumbled dismally.

"Why?"

He stopped at the top of the stairs to look down at her, heaving a sigh. "I think I found the reason vampires can't go out in the daylight. It's not a curse, it's a blessing."

And with that he crumbled into bed and pulled the blankets up to his chin; it was the last time he ever wanted to be seen in the light of day again.

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Awwwwww...poor Gavner :P

Thanks for reading and reviewing *hint hint*!

And just to be sure, I have gone in the right order so far, right? It is Dawn, Brilliance, Light, and the next would be Games, correct? I've checked and double-checked the list, but I'm paranoid :D


	4. GAMES

**Important!: **It took me forever to come up with this idea, but now, as I re-read it before posting, I'm starting to wonder if someone else has already done it. Stupid as it sounds, I really don't know if it's only in my head because I made it up, or because I read it before. That having been said, I'm feeling like it's at least mostly original, but if you have/know someone else has written something just like it, I TOTALLY apologize and if you let me know, I swear I'll take it down immediately. Please bear in mind that this is all pure stupidity, not thievery, I promise! Again, if this was someone else's idea, I'm really, really sorry and I will delete it asap.

And yes, I'm definitely having an off-day :P

**Pairing: **There's a tiny bit of Arra/Larten. You just have to squint a little...

**Warning: **Contains spoilers for pretty much everything :D

**Fourth word: **_GAMES_

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Desmond Tiny loved games.

All his pieces were laid out in front of him, within his reach and at his whim. He could control them as much or as little as he wanted to. Sometimes he was a whisper on the wind, sometimes a voice in the weak-minded, and sometimes, he was himself, a strange little man in rainboots.

Of course there were rules, that made it a game as opposed to a free-for-all, but Des Tiny was a master rule-bender. He didn't have a preferred side, because he didn't look at it as good versus evil. He knew that within evil there was compassion, and within good there was corruption.

Most of the pieces, he didn't particularly care about, but that didn't mean they weren't useful. These non-essential pieces were his pawns; the first to move, the first to die, but also the first to affect the actions and reactions of the other pieces, the important ones, the ones he kept a very close eye on.

Sam Grest was a pawn moved early. Mr. Tiny had given him nudge his square and into the Cirque du Freak to stir things up a bit. If it hadn't been for the stupid Darren Shan and his aversion to blood, Sam Grest need not have gotten involved, and thus killed, but as was such in a game. The little touch-and-go, tense moments that arose when he moved Sam out were the moments he lived for. Death, guilt, and fear just added excitement.

Debbie Hemlock and Evra Von, those were pawns he used with a bit more intent, a bit more caution. They joined the fray early, but then he moved them to the side and out of harm's way, only to bring them back later to add to the epic ending.

Gavner Purl was no mere pawn - he contributed to the battle, had his victories, but eventually his part was not much more than that of Sam Grest's. His death, seemingly so unjust, added to the pain that would come in the end. It came down to the same for Arra Sails. He put her together with Larten Crepsley just so he could tear them apart, and like a piece of cloth, once it had torn, it could never be sewn together quite perfectly again. When she died so cruelly, so did a part of Larten, and he was a key player. Kurda Smahlt sat on the line of each team in an attempt to make peace. The players that fought for peace always fell the hardest when their time was over.

Larten Crepsley was perhaps the third most essential player of them all; he not only affected, but more-or-less shaped the kings on both sides of the board. In the end, even when his piece had long since been knocked to the floor, he would drive one king with their intense hatred and bitterness, and the other with their desire for revenge.

Whichever king would prevail in the finale of the game was a toss-up, but either way, it would be a messy, bitter end for both teams and any piece that had the misfortune to have survived to that point - sometimes dying sooner rather than later was the easier way to go.

Desmond Tiny was playing the game of life, and in his eyes, he was the unbeatable player, and this game he would never lose.

The best know that there is always someone better, who will control their pieces with greater precision, who will bend the rules farther.

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I've never written anything quite like this before, so let me know what you think. You know that feeling when you're trying to write something deep, or serious, and all of the sudden you snap out of verbose-philosophical-mode and go, "My God, I'm a rambling idiot!". I kinda had one of those moments half-way through this, so we'll see if you agree with me :P.


	5. INNOCENCE

**A/N: **This one was harrrrrrrrd, way harder than I thought it was going to be. I considered _everything _here, and came up with an idea I liked better than this one, but as I started writing it, I decided it was too dark for an 'T' rating and I didn't want to have to bump this up to an 'M', and so I eventually ended up with this. This isn't happy either, nor is it very original, but hey, I was stuck.

Yeah, and um, there's no pairing in this, I don't know if it was a rule that there had to be, but if it was, please don't send the fanfiction police after me!

**Fourth word: **_Innocence_

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"Do not, under any circumstances, allow a single one of the vampaneze to get away. If even one escapes, there'll be an army of them after us before daybreak. Are we clear?"

Each of the vampires this commanded had been directed at nodded, their grips on their weapons tightening. This was their first mission, and they had been unlucky enough to end up under the charge of the most formidable of the high-ranking Generals, Arra Sails. The three men and their female captain were standing just within the bounds of a densely wooded forest, about to storm a nearby cave, where they had been told several rogue vampaneze were hiding out.

With a wave of Arra's hand, the four of them began to advance, creeping out of the wood cover and towards the cave. Arra halted, and the three vampires behind her followed her lead and silently stood still as Arra scrunched up her face and cocked her head. Then, sighing contentedly, she looked back at the anxious men before her. "Sounds like five of them," she said calmly, and the three vampires exchanged glances tentatively - they heard nothing. "We'll be fine if you keep your wits about you. You two - " she pointed at the two larger vampires, named Ghodrat and Rambique, "can take whichever two are nearest to the front, Camule and I will finish the rest." Camule seemed to relax a bit upon hearing this, but as Arra's head snapped around to give him a warning look, he straightened up and re-affixed his hold on his sword. She gave a defiant huff, then turned away and started for the cave, her young accomplices following quickly. Several steps before they would go into view of their targets, Arra turned one last time to mouth, "Leave no survivors." Camule, Rambique, and Ghodrat nodded, and without another word, Arra darted forward on the attack.

They had the element of surprise and order working for them. The vampaneze were neither ready for the assault nor able to organize fast enough to properly defend themselves. Before four out of the five could get to their feet, Arra had thrown a knife at the one vampaneze who had stood, a large, authoritative-looking one in the back of the cave, and it had stuck deep in his chest. As soon as their comrade toppled over, the others seemed to be sparked into action, drawing out whatever weapons they could find, and the combat began.

The battle was easy for Arra; within three minutes she had downed two opponents and was stepping back to observe her pupils, ready to jump in if necessary. But they all seemed to be holding their own, it wouldn't be long now. As her eyes traveled through the cavern, she happened to spot something, something small, near the mouth of the cave. She frowned and squinted, curious to see what it could be. It was moving very slowly in lopsided, painstaking steps. Was it an animal? After checking to be sure none of the vampires would be needing her help, she took off after it, determined for some unidentifiable reason to find out what it was. As she neared it, it became apparent to her what it was, and it caused a distant, forgotten feeling in her chest, a sort of pressure or pull, she couldn't quite pinpoint it. In front of her was a small, very small, vampaneze, and though she had never heard of vampaneze blooding such young people, it seemed that the light-purple figure was no more than ten. She was sure she hadn't noticed him when they first entered the cave, and while she had sensed all the other vampaneze, she had had no idea that this child was present. She felt the corner of her mouth twitch as she watched him. In his shoulder was stuck the tip of a spear - she recognized it as Ghodrat's - and his small fingers were pulling at it, trying to tear it out of his skin as he tried to limp to his escape. She winced at the blood that had already poured out down his chest and side and was leaving a trail behind him. A few minutes and he'd die from loss of blood, faster if he succeeded in removing the spearhead. If his wound was sealed and the tip removed now, he could still make it. She could do that, she could spare him from missing out on a life he'd never have if she turned the other way. He was an harmless little boy, he didn't deserve to die so unfairly.

As Rambique's dagger shot through the air, she might have been able to stop it, but she didn't. It wasn't because she didn't want to, because she did, more than she had wanted anything in years, but she seemed fixed to her spot, watching it in slow motion as it traveled straight into the boy's little stomach. He gave a scream as it punctured through his skin, and he fell to the ground. It was too late now. She started forwards to him, reaching a hand out as though trying to offer him some comfort even from that distance. Of course, she didn't get to him in time, but as he took his final breath, his eyes met hers for a second, if that, before they went dark. The look in his eyes broke her more even than the sound of his cry when he was stuck had. It was a look of a hope for the future, and youth, and innocence. Innocence: it was something she hadn't known for a long, long time. And just as hers had once upon a time, his innocence disappeared like a whisper in the wind. Arra wondered if he knew that she hadn't saved him.

She stared at his motionless body for a long while, long after the fighting behind her had finished. Finally, Camule's call of, "Arra?" pulled her away from the bloody little body crumpled on the ground. She spun around to face the vampires , all of whom were standing several feet back, watching her with confusion.

"What?" she asked numbly.

"Is something wrong?" Ghodrat asked. "We did it, we killed the scum, every single one of them!"

Her whole body tightened - how did he say it with such enthusiasm, like he had won some stupid game? Did he not understand that they had just murdered six other living beings? After all, careless slaughter was what they hated the vampaneze for, it seemed cruelly ironic that they would solve the problem by mowing them down as they hid unsuspectingly in this cave.

The vampires were still watching her, wonder in their eyes. "Weren't those your orders?" Rambique asked tentatively.

She looked blankly at them all for several more tense seconds, then, closing her eyes for a fraction of a beat as she turned away, muttered miserably, "Yes, those were my orders." She could hear them begin to celebrate as she walked out of the cave, her shoulders slumped. They had finished their first missions as Generals, of course they were celebrating.

She would remember that they were on her orders till the day she died.


	6. DARKNESS

**A/N: **Word six, yeah! This one's really short - like, really, really short, sorry. Why so short? For some reason I was feeling bent on getting this up quickly since I took so long with the last one. Soooo...yeah, I kinda just came up with this, wrote it, and here it is... :)

**Sixth Word: **_Darkness_

* * *

Larten Crepsley was sitting on top of his trailer, his cape drawn tightly around his slumped shoulders as he stared out into the star-smattered sky. All his fellow performers were long since asleep. With no where to go and nothing to do, he had gone to sit up there by himself, with nothing but his thoughts and the darkness to keep him company. During his nearly two centuries as a vampire, he had become very accustomed to life in the darkness, and hadn't given that pestering restriction of not being able to be out in the daylight much thought. The fact that he wasn't able to hear the birds as they sung during sunrise wasn't much of a big deal to him. He had long ago accepted that he would never see the rays of the sun through a leafy canopy, or that he could never feel the gentle warmth on his skin on a soft summer's day. What bothered him was that the darkness confined the company he kept. Tonight, for example, the show had finished, the audience had all gone home, and the Cirque du Freak performers headed straight for their beds, exhausted and requiring rest before their trek to a different city started bright and early the next day. Larten, having slept all day, wasn't even remotely tired, and so had bid them all a good night and gone alone to his trailer, where he had sullenly watched his spider eat an entire dead mouse he had found outside. Then he had draped the cloth over her cage and was once again alone.

Occasionally, during the last decade he had spent with the Cirque, Hibernius Tall would keep him company during these long and lonely nights, but even he would eventually turn in, and Larten would spend the remainder of the night by himself. It was one of the things Larten missed most about Vampire Mountain. There, he was surrounded by his own type, who bared the same aggravating limitation. When he was awake, he was surrounded by his friends and colleagues and his mate...ex-mate - it was still hard to swallow that Arra was no longer his mate. If things had not ended so messily between them, he may have considered going back, but after their final argument it was out of the question. He was sure she hadn't told anyone what the last disagreement had been about, but he had left immediately after, making his intentions to resign as a General clear. He was sure that she wasn't the only one who thought that he was letting down the vampire clan, and he believed that he would never be welcomed back.

And so Larten Crepsley had been with the Cirque du Freak since he had left the mountain. While surrounded by fellow performers, he felt that he couldn't truly call any of them friends. He was trapped, very much alone, by the darkness.

* * *

Told you it was short :P Kinda cliché and boring, but thanks for reading, and please review!


	7. LONELY

**Seventh word: **_Lonely_

**A/N: **Beautiful days always make me want to write (is that bad, that I'd rather sit inside and write than be outside on a gorgeous Saturday? Probably)! But now it's 11:30 and I'm waiting for my bird to finish eating so I can put him to bed so that _I_ can go to bed, and I'm really tired but I wanted to get this up tonight, and it's not such a beautiful Saturday anymore, it's dark and hot, and now I'm kind of hungry too, and I'm rambling so I'm gonna stop, but yeah, so whatever. Right, ahem, anyway, here's 'Lonely' :D

_

* * *

_Kurda was completely absorbed in his map, so much so that he didn't see or hear Gavner, who was running through a connecting tunnel. Kurda's head was down, and Gavner was going too fast to stop. As Gavner shot out into the main tunnel, Kurda happened to be right in front of him, and the two crashed into each other, hard. Both fell to the ground, and Kurda's map flew out of his hands and landed face down on the floor. He groaned as he pushed himself back to his feet and picked it up; bits of pebble and dirt had stuck to wherever there was wet ink and had smudged his last six hours of work.

"Sorry," Gavner apologized, giving Kurda a clap on the back and handing him the now empty bottle of ink.

"It's fine," Kurda grumbled, massaging his shoulder where it had collided with Gavner's chest. "Not the first time it's happened."

Gavner looked down at the ruined map. "Sorry, mate," he said again, grimacing. "Anything I can do to fix it?"

Kurda hesitated. "I'm going to have to backtrack and do it all again," he said, and he didn't have to look at Gavner to know that he would be making a face, "so if you want to help..."

Gavner looked around as though searching madly in the air for a way out. "Er..." he said uncomfortably, not meeting Kurda's eye, "I would, but I was headed to the Hall of Princes, and, you know, I don't want to be late, so..."

"Don't worry about it," Kurda shrugged, giving him a forced smile; of course Gavner didn't want to help him make a map, what normal vampire would?

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Later that night, Kurda was sitting alone in the Hall of Kheldon Lurt, finishing a bowl of lukewarm bat broth. He'd been there for over an hour, eating slowly to help pass the time. Most of the vampires had headed to the Hall of Sports. For the first time in decades, Mika Ver Leth and Arrow would be fighting each other, and almost everyone had headed off to watch what promised to be an epic battle. He knew that if he finished now - which he could, he only had a couple bites left - he would still have time to go join the spectators, but he didn't want to. What was the point of watching two Princes bash each others' heads in? It would be like any other match he had seen, or, worse yet, participated in, but with a little more blood. Where was the thrill there?

He heard hurried footsteps coming from the entrance to his right, and soon, Arra Sails had dashed into the hall. She didn't seem to notice him at first, but halfway to door on the other side - the one that would take her to the Halls of Sport - she stopped and turned halfway around to look at him.

"Kurda," she said, the familiar curt edge to her voice that was present whenever she spoke to him.

"Arra," he nodded politely. "I would have thought you'd be the first one there to watch this anticipated event."

"Wanted to be," she said, tapping a foot anxiously. "Other things got in the way. Aren't you coming?"

He opened his mouth to reply, but before he could, she rolled her eyes. "What was I thinking, of course you aren't," she said critically. "Afraid someone will want you to get up there and fight, are you?"

"No," he said, eating his soup as slowly and calmly as ever. "I don't think it's very interesting. It would be quite a waste of my time."

She rolled her eyes again. "It's not a 'waste of time'," she snapped. Kurda wished he had a dime for every time he'd heard her say that. "It would do you some good to start thinking like a vampire and not a human. You'll be a Prince soon, Kurda, act like one."

He shrugged; her words didn't sting as much as they used to, he was accustomed to them now. "Brains over brawn, Arra, brains over brawn."

For a second, she stared at him, and he tensed, just in case she decided to attack him with a chair. Then, to his surprise, she smiled. "You know, I used to think the same way," she said, and he smiled back as he remembered the little half-vampiress, who was constantly telling her friends, "Don't be _stupid, _think before you act!". Present-day Arra's smile faltered as she finished, "And then I smartened up. Brains _and _brawn."

Kurda sighed and looked dismally into his bowl. Far off in the distance, they heard the strike of a gong, which meant that the fight was about to start.

"Charna's guts!" Arra cursed, and began to hurry off again, faster now than before. "Good night, spineless twit."

"Good night, know-it-all," he retorted, unable to stop himself from grinning. He used to call her that all the time when they were young. But then she had changed; all his friends from his youth had. Kurda never did. Why had't he?

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

It was nearly dawn, and Kurda had finally made it to his room, staggering through the door completely exhausted and collapsing into a chair. He had had a very long, very tiring, very depressing night. It seemed that his life had turned into a monotonous pattern comprised of two things: being bombarded with questions and being insulted, not necessarily in that order, and not always separated. Everyone wanted his opinion on something or another, but, ironically, no one had respect for him, even though he would become a Prince in a matter of months. Sometimes, he would sit down and tell himself that he'd figure it out, he'd get to the bottom of their issues with him and do what he could to fix it. But he didn't even really have to think about it. He knew why people didn't like him, it was because he was unlike them in so many ways. He could spend hours sitting and thinking, thinking about anything, whereas his fellow vampires would get anxious sitting for more than ten minutes. He liked having deep conversations, most vampires would rather joke and shove each other around. He liked to talk things out, they liked to, well, knock things out. Of course they didn't like him, they couldn't relate to him; he was the strand of thread in a box of needles. Kurda pressed his palms into his eyes and sighed heavily; he was so lonely.

* * *

_I don't think I like that last line, but I couldn't come up with any other way to actually stick the word 'lonely' in there, and, let's face it, if I didn't use it at least once it would have been totally pathetic. Please let me know what you thought about it, and thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far!_


	8. FREE

**A/N: **So, I realized I've never really written anything in the first person from Larten's POV, and so I decided on this! It was actually really hard for me, and I don't think it turned out too well, but let me know what you think! Thanks :)

**Eighth word: **_Free_

_

* * *

_After ten years, my vampire superpowers, or "strengths", as Seba liked to call them,still seemed like a fantastic gift to me. My favorite of all was my brighter mind. Seba said this didn't have anything to do with my vampire strengths, but that a sharper mind came with time, and when I was older, I'd realize that I know at this point in time only a fraction of what I'll know in the future. He said it would come with age and maturity. Maturity my ass, my mind was sharp as a whip. Not to say I was infallible, and I certainly wasn't going to let myself grow cocky, but it was a very welcomed benefit. After all, I didn't say that I was brilliant on my own doing, I attributed it to my vampire blood. That wasn't an ego, it was completely logical and down-to-earth.

The one downfall of my brilliance was that lots of things were beginning to seem foolish and frustrating. For example: vampire laws; Seba; the mountain; Seba; the fact that I didn't have freedom; and Seba were just some of the things that irked me. Seba was constantly smiling and shaking his head condescendingly at me when I voiced opinions or ideas. He said I was young and eager to help, but that I still obviously needed his careful guidance. He said my head was inflated because of my age. I told him that that was absurd. He told me that I was the equivalent of a human teenager.

So of course, when a fellow half-vampire, who shared many of my same feelings towards being held captive in this child-like state, made a plan to gain us temporary freedom, I readily and willingly agreed to take part. I admitted to myself (and myself only) that it was possible that I let the fact that said half-vampire happened to be a pretty, smart, funny, fierce-in-an- endearing-sort-of-way young lady influence my decision slightly as well.

"I already asked Gavner," said Arra Sails. She was sitting on the floor of my cell as she went over her plans for our freedom with me. Her legs were stretched out in front of her, and she was flexing and pointing her toes repeatedly as she spoke, always unable to sit still. I was sitting on my coffin, listening intently to her every word. "He said he doesn't want to, said it might screw up his plans of becoming a full vampire." Gavner had been a half-vampire longer than either of us, and the goal was for him to spend six more years as a half-vampire, then be fully blooded and start life as a true vampire. Arra's idea was for us to sneak out of Vampire Mountain the next morning while everyone was sleeping and see how long we could go without being caught by our mentors, something that wouldn't necessarily help Gavner's cause. It would give us a chance to be free of their over-controlling rules, something we hadn't been without for years. "Of course, I asked Kurda as well," Arra continued, making a face. "Three guesses what _he _said." She rolled her eyes; Kurda was the oldest and most gutless of us all, something that aggravated Arra to no end. "So it looks like it's just you and me."

_Just you and me_: it was the best phrase in the English language. I couldn't help but grin stupidly when she said it, though she seemed too absorbed in her own thoughts to notice my dumb smile or reddening throat.

"I figure we'll go out through the southeast tunnel," Arra said, rolling onto her stomach and pulling a piece of chalk out of her pocket. On the stone floor, she began to draw a bare-bones map to show me what she meant. I slid off my coffin to sit next to her - as close as I dared - so I could see it. "There's only one guard there, and he'll be easy to get by," she said, drawing a stick figure next to an area she had circled. I didn't know about that, but she seemed so sure, and even if she hadn't, I wasn't going to disagree with Arra. "If we go during the day, he'll probably be dead asleep anyway."

"What about any of the other vampires?" I said. "If we run into one of them, what will we say?"

"We don't have to say anything," Arra said, starting to draw a dotted line down one of her tunnels. "We can walk around the mountain, that's not a crime."

"What if we run into Seba or Arrow?" I scooted closer to her, till my thigh was pressed against her side; I heard her inhale sharply as if a little surprised, but then she smiled and didn't seem to mind, so I stayed there.

"If we go this way," she pointed to the line she was drawing, "they won't. They never go down those tunnels, only the cooks and guards ever do." She must have noticed the uncertainty on my face, because she grinned and asked, "What, scared?"

"No," I said stiffly, giving her a playful shove that barely moved her. "I just want to be sure that we will not get caught."

"You know, they're going to notice that we're gone sooner or later and come after us," she said, hitting me back, harder. "Chances are we won't even make it down the mountain."

"I know that," I said, "but I would prefer to be caught later rather than sooner. At least we will get a taste of freedom before our mentors catch us and throw us into a pit of rabid vampaneze."

"We won't get caught leaving," she assured me. "I've got it all figured out. As soon as the vampires turn in for the day, I'll come and get you, and we'll be free before sunrise."

I wanted to tell her that I wasn't sure, that I needed time to think before I left the mountain and openly defied my mentor, but her gray eyes were shining brightly, and her face was flushed with excitement. After all, what was there to be unsure about? For the past year, I had known that I was capable of taking care of myself, so if Arra and I escaped the mountain, what could possibly go wrong? We would be free!

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

"Larten, get up!" Arra's slender, yet intimidatingly strong, hand shook my shoulder, and my head lifted wearily off the table. At first, I was disoriented - why was I sleeping with my head on my table, and why was Arra waking me up? Then, it all came back to me and I smiled. I must have fallen asleep waiting for her, as I had been doing all night. The sleep seemed to do me some good, because the reluctance I had felt earlier was gone, and had been replaced by eager anticipation. "Time to leave," Arra said, feet tapping excitedly on the ground.

I stood up and grabbed the small bag of clothes and water I had packed earlier, and Arra led the way out into the tunnels. I tried to step lightly, but she rolled her eyes. "You just look more suspicious when you walk like an idiot," she said. "Just be normal, and no one will think anything." Be normal...what was normal walking? Despite the fact that I barely remembered how to walk at all at the moment, I tried my best not to do anything to call attention to us. Arra led the way - I had no idea where we were going, I'd only been to this part of the mountain a couple times.

"Just a little farther," she said quietly after several minutes, stepping up to a corner in the tunnel and peering around. She pulled away from it suddenly, her eyes growing wide, and clamped a hand over her mouth. I hurried forward and mouthed, "What is it?" She pointed to the corner, gesturing for me to look myself. I threw the hood of my cape up to conceal my red hair - not always the most inconspicuous - and carefully edged up to have a look. I held my breath as I looked around, my heart pounding in my ears. Then, suddenly... "Gotcha!"

I jumped and - just barely - held back a full-out yell when two hands pinched my sides: Arra's hands. I turned around, panting and still shaking, as she collapsed into the wall laughing. "That..." I gasped, lost for words, "that was...not amusing."

She slid down on the floor, still hysterical as I glared at her. "That was," she coughed between cackles, "the best thing I've seen in years."

"Not funny," I said sourly, as the stitch in my side slowly began to fade off.

"It was a freakin' riot," she said, pressing her hands to her mouth in a feeble attempt to muffle her giggles.

I crossed my arms and didn't uncross them till she had stood up, brushed herself off, and swallowed the rest of her laughing. She cleared her throat and grinned sheepishly. "Sorry, but I couldn't resist. You seem to tense. Loosen up." I grumbled at her under my breath, but when she reached out a small hand to me apologetically, all irritation vanished and I felt a warm wooshing in my stomach. Smiling back at her, I took her hand, and she led the way through the rest of the tunnels. I wondered if my hand felt as sweaty to her as it did to me.

Several minutes later, she stopped, and I came up next to her, prepared for her to try and scare me again. Instead, she stood on her tiptoes and leaned in towards my face, and my heart started to beat faster. I tried to conceal my disappointment when her lips stopped an inch away from my ear and she began to whisper instructions. "We have to be sure the guard's asleep, okay?" she said. "Don't make any noise, just see if you can hear him."

We stood perfectly still, and, having returned to the flats of her feet, her head was just about as close to my shoulder as it could be without touching, our hands still clasped. I half expected her to turn around and shush me at any given second and tell me that my blood was pumping too loudly. But it must have only sounded loud to me, because after a couple minutes, she nodded at me and we started off again. "He's fast asleep," she assured me, just audibly.

We rounded a corner, stepped over the guard, softly pushed open the stone doors, and stepped out of the mountain. Neither of us said anything at first; we needed to get a decent distance away in case the guard woke up. We hurried down the rocky slope till the doors were barely visible, then turned to each other, grinning like ten-year-olds.

"We did it!" I said, hugging her.

"Look," she said excitedly, pointing to the treeline as she pulled away from me. "Sun's not even peeping up yet." She was right, the sky was still perfectly black, except for a small dark-blue glow above the trees that meant the sun wasn't far from rising."Told you we'd be free by sunrise. Come on!"

She led the way down the rocks, stumbling over the hidden ruts and rolling pebbles, but still fast enough that I had to pay attention to keep up. That was it, we were free. We could do whatever we wanted out here. Though, now that we had gotten out of the mountain, nothing particular was coming to mind. What didn't Seba let me do? What did Arrow not let Arra do? There weren't a whole lot of things - I couldn't come up with any. Still, I was glad to be out in the open air, and especially happy to be with Arra, so I didn't voice this thought.

We had almost gotten to the trees when Arra stopped and turned. "You wanna see if we can get all the way down the mountain before they catch us?" she asked, and I nodded, not having any other ideas. "Hurry up, then!" We would never get to the bottom in time...I was starting to think freedom wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

We started to run again, and when we reached the trees, we didn't stop. Not when the leaves crunched under our feet, or when I had to leap over a fallen truck almost as thick as I was tall. Not even when a hand reached out and grabbed Arra by the elbow. But then, the hand closed its grip, and Arra skidded to a stop, and I felt something tap me on the shoulder. Arra and I spun around, our faces already wilted, and found ourselves face-to-face with Seba, whose expression was stern and reprimanding, and Arrow, who looked something between amused and, well, pissed.

Both of our heads bowed, we avoided each other's eye. Our mentors seemed to want to give it a few silent seconds to let the guilt sink in. Finally, Seba said, "That was a very nice drawing on Larten's floor, Arra. I left a sponge near it for you to clean up with." My head still hung, but I started to breathe again, slightly hopeful that cleaning my floor would be our only punishment. Arra seemed to think the same thing, because she looked up and nodded at him, mumbling, "Yes, Mr. Nile," but didn't look altogether too unhappy.

I lifted my chin, and Seba was looking grimly at me. He raised his right hand and scraped his pointerfinger and thumb nails together, sending a pyschological shooting pain through my ears already...my punishment wasn't going to end with a filthy bucket of water and a sponge.

Arra and I exchanged dismall glances as we followed our mentors back to the mountain. What I wouldn't give for one more minute free.


	9. CONFUSED

**A/N: **Another sad one. I wanted to write something happy, really, I did. But this was all that came to mind. And besides, a personal goal for this contest was to write a bunch of characters I never have before. So, I've got another couple characters under my belt now :)

**Ninth word: **_Confused_

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* * *

_

Too hot in the sun. Too cold in the shade. Too confined to move from either.

Small. Shaking. Scared. Scarred.

It was dark, and he was afraid. He was eight, tucked into a ball in a corner, his eyes squeeze shut; if he was allowed a drink of water more than three times a week, he would be sobbing. Instead, he gasped for breath, dry-eyed, chest tight. Every bone in his body ached from sleeping on a hard, cold floor night after night. His skin burned from the many lashes and sores that covered his tiny, scaled body, some from recently, some from a long time ago that never had a chance heal. His yellow-green hair, caked with filth, was in snarls and tangles, running down past his shoulders and irritating his raw back. But he was used to it all.

The snake boy heard the footsteps as they neared his cage, the small, glass, empty cage he had spent the past seven years in. It was such a recognizable _thump, clack, thump, clack, thump, clack. _Each _thump _was the thick heel of boots, and the _clack _was the sharp, metal tips - the tip that had collided with his young, scaled side so many times. There was another set of footsteps along with his, no doubt someone coming to gawk at him. He curled in tighter on himself and retracted deeper into the corner. He knew that he would be whipped out, but it didn't matter anymore. He would pay any price for a couple extra seconds of privacy and comfort - if you could call scrunching up in a corner of glass walls either of those.

The footsteps came to a halt, and a fist rapped on the wall of his cage. A gruff voice barked, "Get up, Evra!" - His owner's. Evra hated to think of him as his owner (he despised thinking of him at all) but that was all he knew him as. He had never told Evra his name. He never talked to Evra like a living, breathing person. Slowly, Evra opened one blood-shot eye, wondering if the whip, or burning hot poker, or any of the things he had been hit with in the past were about to strike. But the cage's small door remained locked. It was so late, Evra thought, that maybe his owner had forgotten to grab the keys on the way over with the stranger.

Evra slowly sat up, squinting as a flashlight shined in his eyes. When they finally adjusted, he had a chance to take in the visitor, a man who was staring at him intently. Evra was as used to being stared at as he would ever get, and had learned to somewhat block the cruel observers out, but this man...he was different. Not just in physical appearance - he was tall, taller than any man Evra had ever seen - but in presence. The tall man's eyes bore down at him with a look that confused the young boy, a look he had never seen before. It wasn't disgust, like so many of the expressions of those who watched him, or amazement, or even interest. It was something else, something no one had ever looked at him with - compassion.

Evra couldn't hear too clearly from behind his glass walls, but he could just barely make out the sound when his owner offered the man a price. Of course, the tall man wanted to buy him, wanted to become owner to the incredible, frightening, repulsive snake boy. Evra just shivered - he didn't care anymore. Why would this man be different anyway?

But then, the tall man's hand reached out, almost as if he was going to shake hands with Evra's owner, but then the hand clamped around the owner's throat. It didn't take long, just one quick squeeze and the shorter man dropped dread, not even having time to react. Evra gasped and instinctively stood out of fear, stooping under the low roof of the cage. But as the tall man turned to face him, he had the same look in his eyes, and for some reason, it comforted Evra. Why? He didn't know. When the man opened the door, somehow foregoing the key, Evra scrambled willingly out, his small green body looking like baby's next to the man, but still, he wasn't scared.

The man handed him a warm jacket, a jacket, Evra's brain was racing too fast to notice, that hadn't been in his long arms seconds ago. Evra gratefully accepted it, and the man placed a big hand on his back. "Come along, Evra."

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_Thanks for reading, and remember, good things happen to those who review!_


	10. HAPPINESS

**A/N: **Whoa! I'm halfway through this contest! I didn't think I'd ever get this far, yet here I am :D I was going to wait a little while before posting this chapter, but I have a karate tournament this weekend, and so if my head gets bashed in, I'll have left it off at the halfway point feeling very proud of myself!

I'm staying in my Arra/Larten comfort zone for this one. I know, this idea has been done a trillion times already, but I figured I may as well give it a go now since I probably would have at some point anyway.

Song lyrics from **Happiness **by **_The Fray._**

**Tenth word: **_Happiness_

_

* * *

_

**_Happiness feels a lot like sorrow _**  
**_Let it be, you can't make it come or go_**

"Arra?" Larten called as he entered their room. He draped his cape over the doorknob and said again, "Arra? Are you here?"

"One minute," her voice replied from the only other room, and several seconds later she came around the corner, giving him a quick kiss before thrusting a sheathed dagger into his hands. "I was bored, so I polished it for you. I figured you'd be needing…"

"I want to talk about something," Larten interrupted, his voice tight. Arra raised her eyebrows at his abruptness - usually he listened so carefully to her every word - before deciding that it must be something important. For a moment, she tried to read his green eyes, then, despite the sinking in her stomach, nodded and silently lead the way into the other room, where two chairs were set neatly near a wooden table.

"I think I know what it's about," she said tentatively, turning her head away from him so he wouldn't see her fear. Thirty years; she should have recognized sooner that it would be too long for him. She should have called it off ten years ago at this time, ended it while they were ahead.

"You do?" he asked with a tone of genuine surprise. "I have been trying for the longest time to keep it to myself."

"Yes," she said softly. "You've changed. I've noticed for some time now."

He sighed and reached out to take her hands. She glanced down at them for a moment before yanking them away and chewing on one of her nails as she turned to face him. It pained him to see the tears slowly forming at the corners of her eyes. "I hoped...I hoped it would not effect you so strongly. I know that this is the life we have set out for ourselves, but I want it to change," he said. "I do not take pleasure in this life anymore."

She nodded sullenly and this time didn't pull away as he grabbed at her hands. She managed a pained smile before saying quietly, "All good things must come to an end." Usually a messy, hurtful end - all things that had ever made her happy, at least, though she didn't say it to him then.

He sighed, "I am sorry, my love, but a…recent experience has caused me to take a step back. Is there any chance that you could ever agree with me?" A glint of false hope flashed in his eyes as they came to rest on hers, both staring deep, as if trying to read one another's minds. She shook her head ever so slightly.

"I'm sorry too," Arra choked. "But I'll never agree."

Larten had begun to tear up now; the sight of Arra so unhappy hurt him more than she would ever know. "I am sorry, but it a a decision I had to make for myself."

She nodded, biting back any more tears. "I understand."

Both stared at the ground for a while, each absorbed in their own miserable thoughts. "I suppose," Larten finally broke the silence, "we decide what to do from here. Just because one thing ends, it does not mean that everything has to go with, which brings me to my next subject." She looked up at him, frowning. What could possibly come next? "We have been together now for three decades, and I hope that we can agree upon more time together?"

Arra stared at him for a moment, frowned, and then wiped the tears from her cheeks, a smile just barely being restrained from her mouth. After a few seconds, she couldn't stop herself and broke into a wide smile, laughing gleefully. "Oh, Larten," she said, hitting him on the shoulder, "you've put your overly large foot into your mouth once again."

He stared at her, confused, though he too wiped at his eyes, glad at least that she seemed happier now, even if she was making no sense. "What did you misunderstand?"

"I thought that's what we were talking about!" she said, her face flushed with relief. "I thought that you were saying that it was time for us to go our separate ways, that our relationship wasn't important to you."

"I…what?" Larten said, giving a small, confused chuckle. "You thought that I did not want to be with you anymore?"

Arra nodded and they both began to laugh. She pulled him into a hug as they laughed, and he kissed what was left of her tears off her eyes. "Do I get an answer now, or has my stupidity bought me a couple nights of waiting for your agreement? As I believe I have said every time our mating time arrangements have come to an end, I see no future for myself without you. Life without you is meaningless and empty." His eyes were wet again.

Arra kissed him deeply. She only stopped to brush her lips by his ear to whisper softly, "I agree."

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Later in the night, she slowly blinked herself awake, her head resting on his chest. She felt his hand tracing against her back and knew that he was already awake. He must have seen her eyes open, because he kissed the top of her head gently. "Larten?" she said, her voice muffled by his bare shoulder.

"Hmm?"

"What _were _you talking about earlier?"

He cringed, then tried to mask it with a smile. "It is nothing, do not worry about it now. There is plenty of time to discuss it later." Her grey eyes narrowed and she sat up. Larten groaned, knowing that now she had brought it up, she wasn't going to let it rest. "I would rather discuss this some other time," he tried futilely again. Her arms folded and still she said nothing. She probably didn't plan to either - Arra had a way of getting him to talk with just her stubborn stare. Finally, he gave in, saying, "I wish this could wait." He sat up and kissed her while he had the chance, knowing that she may very well not let him anywhere near her for several centuries after he said his piece. "I was talking about being a General," he said, painstakingly slowly.

She stared at him blankly. "What?"

He heaved a sigh. "I cannot be a General any longer. I am going to see the Princes tomorrow night to tell them that I am resigning."

For several seconds, she stared silently at him, her expression unreadable. Then her lips pursed and she stood up. "You can't," she said, with so much certainty that Larten nearly agreed. Then he came back to his sense and got up too, placing his hands on her shoulders. "I must. I cannot bear it anymore, Arra. The fighting. The killing. It would be one thing if we only killed vampaneze, but it does not stop there. We kill our own if they break our rules - there is no warning punishment, only death." His voice dropped and became hoarse. "In one week, I leave to kill Terek Herson, the vampire who saved my life six years ago. You remember him?" She didn't answer, but he could tell by the way her glare flickered that she remembered. "And do you know why I have been sent to kill him? He killed a General - a General who drank a cat's blood and went insane; a General we would have been sent to kill anyway. But because Terek is not a General, he has been ordered dead because he killed a higher-ranking vampire than himself. Does that seem right to you, Arra? Should Terek be put to death because he broke a bloody rule?"

She didn't answer immediately. "You are about to become a Prince," she said. "You can complain about the rules then. We're vampires, not toddlers. The only way our clan has survived is on its firm laws."

"But that doesn't mean they shouldn't be overlooked in certain cases!" he barked, and she pushed him away as both tempers flared. "I have been ordered to kill a man who saved my life. What would prevent the Princes from saying that I must kill Seba, or Gavner, or you?" He swallowed. "I am tired of killing, Arra. I want it to stop."

"It's the vampire way," she said coolly. "It's how we survive. If I broke the laws, I would expect to suffer the conseque-" He swore and stormed away from her, but she grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back.

"Do you enjoy it?" he asked, ripping her hand off him. "Killing?"

"Of course I don't," she spat. "I don't want to kill anyone, but if it has to be done, then so be it."

"Well, I want no more part of it," Larten said firmly. "I can hardly live with myself knowing how many deaths I have already brought about. All I want is to be happy with what I have done. I do not want to add to my list of regrets."

Arra's lips were pressed into a thin, stubborn line. "Happiness doesn't last. It's temporary; an ephemeral emotion that only makes you suffer in the end of it all."

"I think that is sad," he said softly. "I thought you believed in happiness, that we are happy together."

"We are..." she looked away from him, "Were. That doesn't change that it'll hurt us both more eventually."

"I am sorry you feel that way," he said, and it was sincere. He crossed the room to snatch one of his many red shirts off a dresser and pull it over his head. "But I would not trade one second of it to ease later pain."

She blinked. "I didn't say I would either. But that's just the way the damn story goes. Life isn't happy. Not for vampires."

"Well," he said, in barely more than a whisper, "it never will be if they continue to murder like savages. I will not condone it, and I will not -." He gathered the remainder of his few sets of clothes into his arms and started for the front room, Arra after him, "-allow the vicious cycle to continue on my part. I will see if I can talk to the Princes now and leave before sunrise." He stuffed his few belongings from around the room into a leather bag and headed for the door.

"So that's it," Arra said from behind him, making him stop. He forced himself to open his eyes as he turned to face her and nod. Her arms were crossed, her jaw set. "So you're just leaving now, and what?"

"Yes," he said, his voice tight. "I do not know 'what', but my time at Vampire Mountain is over." He tied his cape around his neck and with an apologetic, but somehow cold, final sigh of, "I am sorry," he began to leave. Arra followed him to the doorway, but stopped at the threshold, not stepping out into the tunnel. She wanted to say something, but she didn't know what. Finally, she decided on the only thing she could say, the only thing she knew to say. "Good bye." It was soft, very soft, but she could tell from the pause in his step that he'd heard it. She watched his cape flying behind him as he turned the corner of the hallway and disappeared. For several more seconds she stood there staring at the spot where the last billow of red seemed to linger in her mind, then sunk back into the room and slammed the door. She stared at it, biting her lip, but then she realized it didn't matter if she cried or not, there was no one there to see her. And so she buried her face, turned, and slid down the wall onto the floor, not bothering to try to keep her tears back, but instead trying to think of anything but this, the moment she had dreaded since she first met Larten. Even back then, she had known that happiness could never last.

**_Happiness damn near destroys you  
Breaks your faith to pieces on the floor._**

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_I SO wanted to do something happy for this (I mean, hello: HAPPINESS), but for some reason it took a wrong turn. You have no idea how much I want to write a cute, fluffy story, but...no such luck. Anyway, let me know what you thought!_


	11. BLOOD

**A/N: **Another short one. I wasn't sure what to do for 'Blood', and so I just sat and mused on blood. Hence, this has no beginning, middle, or end - it's more like me, through Seba, rambling as I thought about anything having to do with blood. Right. Off you go.

**Eleventh word: **_Blood_

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Blood. Vampires seemed to have an obsession with it.

Maybe it all stemmed from the fact that they drunk blood to survive. Or maybe it was because it seemed to be the only thing consistent with the human definition of vampires. After all, ask any human being what they know about vampires, and the first thing they'll say is, "They drink blood." Chances are, anything they would say after that would be entirely inaccurate. It was possible that vampires were just obsessed with blood for the sake of it. Or maybe, once you'd lived for several centuries, something as essential as blood seemed to grow in importance.

Seba liked to ponder things like blood. He sat in the Halls of Sport, watching as a young General uncorked a flask and took a sip of the thick, deep red liquid. After downing it all, he chucked the small, glass vile into a bin and went to wrestle another vampire, no doubt feeling stronger after his drink. In another area of the hall, two burly vampires were battling on the bars, while Arra Sails shouted instructions from below. At the end of the match, the winner hopped off gloatingly, his bloody nose earning him a clap on the back from his friends. His downed opponent lay on the floor while Arra bandaged a large gash in his bicep, which was spilling blood over her knee and the ground. Finally, as she realized the severity of the injury, she waved over one of the medics that patrolled the hall, who quickly helped her whisk the vampire off to the infirmary; with a wound like that he could bleed out in a matter of minutes if he wasn't properly cared for.

It was ironic really. Blood kept vampires alive, and at the same time, most vampire deaths occurred from injuries resulting in an extensive loss of blood. It gave them both life and death.

Seba wandered absently around the various halls; this time of year, hardly any visitors came to the mountain, and so it was a slow season for him. He smiled at the various vampires he passed, going wherever his feet took him. He didn't notice as he twisted and weaved through the tunnels that the number of vampires around him began to thin as he entered the less-used parts of Vampire Mountain. When he stopped, he looked around and realized that he had inadvertently ended up in the Hall of Cremation. Across the pit from him sat two young guardians of blood; two little girls who were doodling in the unswept ashes and dirt with sticks. One tapped the other as she noticed him, and they both stared in shock, shuffling back. Too old and wise to be superstitious and afraid of them, he smiled to show he meant no harm. With their hands clasped together fearfully, they started to scurry away, but one was taller and faster than the other and the slower girl fell, her knee scraping against a rock. The other one stopped to help her up, and when the girl brushed herself off, she noticed that her knee was bleeding. She looked fearfully at the drops of blood as they trickled down her calf, then up at Seba, who was walking towards them, reaching into his cape for a piece of cloth to give her. The taller girl squeaked something in their unknown language, and both children took off out of the hall. Seba sighed and tucked his handkerchief away. Of course they were afraid of him; they had most likely been told since birth that vampires craved their blood, and only allowed them to live and eat in the mountain in exchange for it. Not that that wasn't true, but vampires weren't evil beings who would suck a child dry, but then how would two little girls know that? All they knew was that vampires wanted their blood.

Seba soon left to return to the Hall of Khledon Lurt, hoping to find some small job to occupy his time. He glanced down at his sleeve, his pants, his cape - every article of clothing on his body - and chuckled - deep red, like blood. He'd always felt that he'd been rather more reserved than his fellow vampires in blood lust (whether as nourishment or evidence of their strength in battle), and now, as he mused about the vital crimson life source, he wondered whether his affinity for red had anything to do with it.


	12. CHILDREN

**A/N: **Set during 'Tunnels of Blood'.

**Word twelve: **_Children_

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Larten Crepsley was a decidedly sound sleeper, and there were only three things that could consistently wake him. One was if something touched his face. He had been unfortunate enough to have things as disgusting as ants, spiders, beetles, and other small beings scurry across his face and startle him out of his sleep on more than one occasion. The second thing, and the most annoying of all, was Gavner's snoring. It could hardly be called snoring at all; roaring like a bear with a bullet in its paw was more like it. He had spent one too many sleepless nights next to Gavner, his hands clamped to his ears, fearing that the roof would cave in. Even with every threat of death on his head, Gavner rumbled like an earthquake each night, unremitting to the point that Larten took to sleeping with a wall between them, even when traveling. The third and final thing that could force Larten out of sleep: children.

"LOOK OUT, those mushroom things are gonna pass you on the...oh man, you lost!" Larten gave a groan as Evra's shouting snapped him awake like a kick in the face. For the past two weeks, every night had been spent hunting for a crazed vampaneze, and for the last six days, he had been awakened by some such disturbance.

"It's not a 'mushroom thing'!" Darren exclaimed exasperatedly, as Larten tried to cover his ears with a pillow. "It's Toad and Toadette!"

"Whatever," Evra grumbled. "You suck at this, let me have a go."

"Come on, one more," Darren insisted. "I did better this time!"

"Fine, but hurry up, _The Simpsons _starts in five minutes."

Larten sat up, recognizing the name '_The Simpsons_' as the show he had been woken up by the morning prior. When he had gone to investigate, he found Darren and Evra roaring with laughter as a fat, yellow, bald man strangled his son on the television. Now, as Larten shuffled to tell them to be quiet, the scene on the screen had been replaced by a cart with two oddly-colored men sitting on it, one throwing bananas off the back. The cart seemed controlled by an oddly-shaped object in Darren's hand, connected to a box under the television, and judging by the fact that the cart was slamming repeatedly into a wall, it didn't seem as though he was doing very well.

"Darren, Evra," he said, trying to keep the snap out of his voice. Both boys turned, smiles sliding off their faces. "What do you think I am going to tell you two?"

"The same thing you told us yesterday," Darren said dismally. "And the day before, and the day before that: 'Keep it down, you're sleeping'. Sorry, we were just having fun."

Larten sighed, massaging his temples as he felt a migraine coming on. "I know," he grumbled. "I do not mind if you watch the television, or play a game, or laugh, but _please,_" he emphasized the word, "do it quietly."

"All _right,_" Darren said irritably. "We'll be quiet." He gave Evra a look, and the two turned to Larten, their faces set critically.

"Thank you," Larten said, trying to add an appreciative smile at the end so they'd stop looking at him so angrily. As he closed the door joining the two rooms behind him, he overheard Darren complain, "He never lets me have any fun. It's so unfair."

As Larten climbed into bed and covered his head with the blankets, he couldn't help but feel a little guilty; they were only children.

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Sorry, it was really short. Anyway, thanks for reading, and you know how happy reviews make me so go on, click that 'review' link, you know you want to :D


	13. LIFE

**A/N: **When I realized I had gotten all the way to number thirteen without good old Vancha, I just knew I had to write one for him, and so, _voila_! Here's a little overview of Vancha's life (see that, I even used the word in the a/n! Do I get bonus points? XD) pre-vampire.

**Thirteenth word: **_Life_

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Vancha Harst despised his life. In theory, the thought of being a vampaneze hadn't seemed too bad when he was a human. Killing didn't seem so terrible when you were on the streets. His father had been killed in a war, his mother murdered by enemy troops not long after. And so at thirteen, Vancha was homeless, with only his brother, Gannen, older by three years, to look after him. They begged for food and fought shelter. After three years of everyday struggling for survival, he had been awakened one night when a strange, purple-skinned man took refuge in the sewer they had been sleeping in. The man said his name was Spier Larskip and he was a vampaneze.

Spier explained the vampaneze lifestyle to the brothers. When he said that vampaneze fed on human blood, he told them that it wasn't cruel or evil; through drinking a person's blood, they could carry a part of that person on for many years, much longer than any human would live. He said it was a quick and painless way to die, and they often fed off the old and sick - ones who would die in a matter of time anyway. Vampaneze avoided feeding from children. Spier offered to make Gannen and Vancha his assistants, and half blood them as vampaneze. He promised them a never-ending supply of food, shelter, and super-human powers. It seemed that this was the solution to their problem, that their life was taking a turn for the better.

At first, everything seemed to be better for them than it had been for years. Gannen adjusted easily - he got along well with their mentor and the other vampaneze. Vancha tried his hardest to follow his older brother's lead. At the beginning, it wasn't too hard; everything Spier had said was the truth. They were well fed, strong, and welcomed like family by their fellow vampaneze. But it wasn't long before Vancha began to have second thoughts about his new lifestyle. It first hit him a year in, after he had drunk from an elderly woman. Spier and Gannen were keeping a lookout outside her house, and so he took his time and glanced around her bedroom before he left. On the back wall, in plain sight from where he stood, there hung a large, beautiful portrait of five people. One, sitting in a chair in the middle, was the woman he had just drunk from - the woman whose life he had just snuffed out like a small flame. She was smiling, and had a hand resting on the little boy sitting in front of her. Next to him, standing, was a woman, who, even though considerably younger, held a striking resemblance to her now-dead mother. The two children sitting on the floor in the front, Vancha assumed, were grandchildren. Suddenly, a sickness washed over him as he looked at the happy family in the portrait, the family that would, in a matter of days, realize that their mother, or grandmother, had been murdered. And that was when Vancha began to detest what his life had become.

Gannen could always tell when something was wrong, and for the weeks that followed that first incident, he pestered Vancha with questions about what had so suddenly put him into such a deep depression that he no longer ate or slept. Vancha downright refused to tell him; Gannen had taken care of him for years, and was a loving and kind older brother even in the worst of times, and Vancha would not allow his disgust in himself to rub off on him. Gannen deserved to be happy, something which Vancha feared he would never be again.

Incident after indecent occurred every time Vancha forced himself to feed: knowing that he had robbed a dog of its owner, had left a family without a father, had taken a daughter from her mother. After four years, he could no longer take it. He knew he had only two options. The first was to stop feeding, and eventually, he would starve and die. The second was to leave the vampaneze clan, go off on his own, and hope that he could make it on partial feedings. When he told Spier and Gannen of his request to leave, Spier told him that it was out of the question. The penalty for an assistant who left their mentor and abandon the clan was death, and vampaneze held true to their laws. Vancha said that if death was what it had to come to, so be it; it would be preferable to killing anymore. If he stopped feeding it was inevitable anyway. That was when Gannen cut in. He begged and pleaded with Spier to spare his little brother. When Spier still refused, he declared that if he tried to kill Vancha, he would have to kill him as well. Both Gannen and Vancha had been loyal assistants, and had become like children to Spier, and so he finally agreed that he would let Vancha leave on the condition that he never have dealings with the vampaneze again, not even his brother. Gannen never gave Vancha a chance to decide for himself - he immediately agreed, and told Vancha to run, to get as far away from them as he could, and live the rest of his life safely. Spier agreed that he needed to leave at once. The brothers never had a chance to say goodbye.

Vancha struggled to live like a vampire. He always intended to take small amounts of blood from his victims, but every time he tried to pull himself away, it was as though a set of invisible hands grabbed him and forced him to keep drinking, until the defenseless human had been sucked dry. After a year, he became able to control himself a bit more, and for the first time ever, drank enough to leave a human alive. He hid in the shadows after feeding, panting as he restrained himself, but smiled when the young man slowly sat up, shook his head, and stared uncertainly around. Needing to cling onto a tree branch to control himself from pouncing, Vancha waited till the man stood, brushed himself off, and walked entirely out of view before congratulating himself. He thought that he had conquered his vampaneze blood once and for all, and outsmarted his blooded instincts. His triumph didn't last long. The following night, the vampaneze in him fought back, and it resulted in not one, but two women being sucked dry. For the next three years it carried on like this: he spared a human or two for a couple nights, and ended up killing more in a savage lust for blood in the nights that followed.

It was five long, miserable years after breaking away from the vampaneze that the unthinkable happened. After going three weeks with only partial feedings, Vancha, crazed and starving, stumbled across a brick building in the midst of destitute city - a children's home. He broke in, and unable to stop himself, drained three young children of their life. It was then that he decided that he could no longer live like this; he was a monster - he deserved to die.

He got as far away from civilization as possible, lost himself deep within a forest, and bound his ankles to a sturdy tree, trying to tie a knot he would be unable to undo as he became desperate for food and weak with hunger. There he stayed - a day turned into two, into a week, which turned to three. He couldn't help himself from eating any small animals that crossed his path, and they were keeping him alive, but that was starting to change. His body was beginning to slow down; he would wake up with unbearable headaches, throw up from terrible dizzy spell, and blink his eyes open when he couldn't quite remember falling asleep. At week four - maybe more, he had long lost count - he knew that the end was near. He shook uncontrollably at all hours, his hair sticking to his damp and burning face. His strength was gone to the point that he couldn't drag himself to his feet, and instead took to curling into a ball on the forest floor. He knew that he would soon be no different than the many leaves around him - a decaying mass, with no life left to live.

Vancha could barely lift his eyelids by the time the one-eared stranger appeared. He only caught bits of what the man was saying as he slipped in-and-out of consciousness. His name was Skyle...something Skyle. He was a vampire. Through his deteriorating ears, Vancha heard, "I can save you." He didn't know if he responded to the vampire or not - he thought he might have nodded, though he couldn't be sure - but before he knew it, his hands were extended and a piercing burn started to flow through his fingers, up his arms, and eventually began to make his chest sizzle. Even through the pain, Vancha fell once again into unconsciousness.

It was hours later that Vancha awoke. As he forced his eyes open, he noticed the vampire sitting against a tree, paler than before, but smiling. Paris Skyle, that was his name, and he explained to Vancha that he had transfered some of his vampiric blood into him, with the hopes that it would combat the vampaneze blood and restore him to health. It had worked; Vancha felt stronger than he had in weeks - possibly years. He easily freed himself of his binds and left with Paris, eager to learn the vampire way and start out a better, cleaner life.


	14. RAIN

**A/N: **Believe it or not, this is the third oneshot I've written for 'Rain'. I don't know why it was so hard for me, but for some reason, I couldn't seem to write anything good that incorporated 'rain' (I did get about half-way through something I really liked, then suddenly realized that it literally had NOTHING to do with rain...whoops...). So I came up with this. I don't particularly like it because I think it sounds like a lot of my other chapters, but, like I've said before, here's another character under my belt.

Also, I got this idea from Rowan Rawr's entry for 'Confused' - thanks! :)

**Fourteenth word: **_Rain_

_

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_

When the clouds went dark and the rain pattered down, it was like the sky was trying to clean the earth of anything foul. Puddles and little streams formed, rushed down hills and slopes into the lakes and sea, and took the dirt and scum with them, washing it away from civilization. And when the clouds went away and the rain stopped, it was a new beginning, with a fresh start on life. Maybe it didn't make things change or disappear, but the cleanliness and clarity allowed a mind to look at things from another perspective, to see the small things make up something beautiful, and the negatives seem a little less horrible. That was what it seemed like to Vanez, at least.

Throughout his life as a human, he had been a victim. A victim of unloving parents when he was a boy, a victim of tragedy when his wife and young son died from the plague, a victim of poverty when he sunk into such a deep depression that he could no longer work. When he was blooded so long ago, he made a vow that whatever faced him in his new life, he would find a way to turn it around, a way to make it something worth living for. It was raining on the night the first vampire blood entered his veins, and he saw it as a rebirth, not just in body, but in attitude. And so, it seemed fitting that whenever it rained, he let the drops wash away his anger, his bitterness, his irritations. By the time it stopped, he could always go on with a smile on his face.

When he had lost his first eye in a battle with a lion, though he was proud of his accomplishment - that was, not dying - he was devastated at the thought of impaired vision. It seemed unfair that a man who lived so long would have to go through it without being able to see the details of life. After his recovery, and after a sit in a rain shower, however, his perspective changed - literally. With his only eye, he realized several hours later in the Halls of Sport, though his peripheral vision was better on one side than the other, one eye focused much faster than two. In a matter of minutes during a spear battle, he had ripped his opponent's weapons away and, with perfect precision, won the match. After a year, he realized that there few matches he didn't win anymore.

When he had just scraped by in his first trials - and he did attribute this to his lack of a second eye; if he had seen the snakes so near to his left, he wouldn't have been bitten and thus wouldn't have almost bled to death - and the Princes told him they couldn't make him a General, he feared that the rest of the vampires would look down on him. And of course, some of them did. But after years of fighting to prove himself to them, a storm passing by Vampire Mountain helped him see otherwise. He began a mission to prove his own worth to himself, and it turned him into the best fighter this generation of vampires had ever seen. He became Games Master, and was often asked to train those who had once jeered at him.

After the first battle in the War of Scars, there were many ill feelings he wanted to wash away. He had lost friends, had been betrayed by colleagues, and could sense a dark future ahead. He convinced Seba to bring him outside of the mountain one rainy night, and stood, eyelids closed over their empty sockets and arms opened to the sky. He stayed that way for minutes, possibly hours, until the last few drops turned to misty air. But this time, it didn't wash his problems away. Maybe it was because when Vanez blinked his eyes open, he still couldn't see the rain.

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Another really short one. But what did you think? Let me know :D Thanks for reading!


	15. SECRETS

**A/N: **Another new character for me :)

**Fifteenth word: **_Secrets_

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"Bye Mom," I called from the front door, cinching up my bag even though I knew it was tight already. Probably a nervous thing.

"Bye Sam," she shouted distractedly from upstairs.

Maybe I should have been a little more sentimental, and given her a hug and a kiss or something; after all, who knew how long it would be till I saw her again. I got the impression the Cirque du Freak didn't return to the same towns too often. I could hear my baby brother crying, and so I knew she was probably too busy to say a proper goodbye anyway. Of course, I hadn't told her where I was going. She might not have minded, but my heart was too set on this to take the chance. I kept a lot of secrets from my parents, and they never minded. They thought it was good and healthy for kids to have their independence and not be afraid of the world. How many times had I heard them complain about our over-protective neighbors ('helicopter parents', they called them, always hovering over their children), who made their kids go to school every day (drove them to school, wouldn't let them walk), brought them inside for dinner at six on the nose every night, and took them to church on Sundays. "Those kids won't know how to function without their parents when they're adults," my dad had said. "They'll be lost and getting into trouble at every opportunity. Our kids know what's safe and smart and what's not."

That's right, I knew right from wrong, and I knew what was best for me. Joining the Cirque was the right thing, I could feel it. It was in my destiny to join up with them. I liked hanging out with Darren and Evra, it was cool. And traveling the world would be incredible. I didn't feel at all guilty not telling my parents where I was going. I had lots of brothers and sister, so they wouldn't miss me too much. And besides, they said they wanted us to be independent and unique. What was more unique than running away with a freak show? I stepped out the door and let it swing closed behind me, smiling. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

I hurried down the street, checking my watch all the way. I was going to hide in the bushes near the Cirque's camp until the show began, then I would sneak into one of the trailers, they'd move before sunrise, and by the time anyone found me, it would be too late to go back.

My timing was great; I slid under the thick brush just as the first few customers began to arrive for the show. I could hear them chattering excitedly, wondering what types of freaks and terrors awaited them inside. I kept as still as possible, afraid someone would notice me. Even though I was hungry and bored and had packed a jar of pickled onions, I was worried that any noise of chewing might alert someone.

I saw Darren once as he went to get a drink of water from a pump in the middle of the camp. I wondered why he wasn't performing in the show tonight, and hoped it didn't have something to do with his...condition. It wasn't that the thought of him suddenly turning into a crazed monster like he'd told me he could didn't scare me because it did, it terrified me. But when I was eight and had the chicken pox, my friend Kyle came and played video games with me, even though he put himself at risk for getting sick. And it made me feel a lot better. Maybe I could do the same for Darren. Even if worst came to worst and he did try to kill me, I figured Evra could stop him.

I knew what he'd say if he saw me now, and so I held my breath until he disappeared again. Letting out a sigh of relief, I noticed that people had stopped arriving. It was pitch black outside, and I could hear the sounds of trumpets. The show had begun. I wasn't going to push it; there could always be late arrivals, or performers running to get last-minute props from their trailers. So I decided to eat some onions and sit it out a little longer.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone running up the path to my right. I ignored them at first, assuming they were late for the show, but as they came into view, I recognized the large man: RV. At first, I considered calling out to him to say hello, but something in me kept me from jumping out of the bush. He wouldn't rat me out to Darren, or the tall man, or anyone, but he had a shifty look in his eyes and a bulging backpack.

Stopping several feet in front of me, RV suddenly jumped, startled, and looked around frantically. When he saw nothing, he muttered, "S'just the damn wind, man, shake it off," under his breath and quickened his pace across the camp. RV wasn't usually this paranoid; something was up. I didn't know what it could be, but he had always been a little weird, so who knew. As the Cirque's newest member, I felt responsible for keeping an eye on any intruders. So, quietly stuffing my snack back into my bag, I slipped out from under the bush and followed him.

I made sure to keep a good distance behind and keep to the shadows. If he saw me while he was in a crazed mood like this, there was no telling what could happen. That bulge in his bag made me a little suspicious.

He had reached the other end of the camp, right next to the rear entrance to the old theater the Cirque was playing in. Stopping for a brief moment, he glanced around till he spotted a thick tree. Then he took off for it. I had to scamper behind a trash bin so he wouldn't see me when he got behind the trunk and peered back in the other direction. It was funny, really. Here RV was, hiding from God-knows-what, and right behind him, here I was, hiding from him. I clamped my teeth to keep from laughing.

After ten minutes or so, he slid back farther into the shadow of the tree, hidden entirely from view, and seconds later I knew why. He was closer to the theater and could hear behind the walls better. Out from the door came three stagehands, pushing something on a rolling stand. Whatever it was, it was big. And covered with a thick, black blanket. And it was growling.

The stagehands left it there, covered, and went back into the theater, laughing loudly at a joke one of them had told. As soon as they had disappeared, RV's head popped out from behind the tree. It was a quiet night, and I could hear the zipper of his pack open. He gave a quick glance in every direction, then jogged out from his hiding spot. In his hands was a large cutter of some sort. My dad had something like it he used to clip back our garden hedges when the neighbors complained. Looking at RV's expression, I didn't think he was going to do any gardening.

He had reached the thing the stagehands had rolled out, ripped off the cover, and, to no surprise, revealed a growling, howling, meat-craving wolfman.

"Freedom, man," RV was saying to the beast, holding up his cutters to the many locks and chains and beginning his job. "We all deserve it, man. No one should be kept in a cage, it just ain't right. Naw, man, I'm settin' you free."

For a split second, it sounded like a good idea; it would stink to be stuck in a cage. Animals shouldn't be kept in them any more than humans.

But then the wolfman roared and I remembered that he wasn't just an animal - he was a monster. I wanted to run forward and stop RV, tell him he was making a terrible mistake, that he was going to get himself - and me - killed. Fear held me back.

Suddenly, something whizzed by me and stopped inches from RV. It was Darren. "What are you doing?" Darren asked, his voice cracking and dumb-struck.

"I'm settin' him free, man!" RV bellowed.

"RV, don't!" Darren shouted. "You don't understand! He's not like a person, or an animal, he's-."

Then everything happened so fast; Darren and RV were arguing about the wolfman, and all at once, RV's angry yells turn to horrified wails. I didn't need a clear view to know what had happened. I could hear the wolfman's chomping, and his snout was covered in blood. The same blood pouring from where RV's hands used to be.

"My hands!" RV shrieked. "Where are my hands?"

Darren tried to calm him, pulling him away from the wolfman's cage, but RV was far past consolable. He was still screaming about his hands, screaming at Darren, calling him a monster. Then he let out a howl and took off into the woods. Darren looked unsure of whether or not to follow him, but after a second, his decision was made for him. There was another howl, but this one was deeper, gruffer, and much scarier than RV's. Darren whipped around and, at the same time I did, saw that the wolfman was out of his cage. Darren gave a gasp and began backing away, towards me.

As I began to run, I could hear Darren - and, terrifyingly, the wolfman - not far behind me. I doubted Darren could see me in the dark, and if he did, I didn't care anymore. All I cared about was escaping and surviving.

I heard Darren's sharp inhale, then cough, as the wind knocked out of his lungs as he hit the ground chest first. I felt selfish and guilty for hoping that it meant the wolfman would leave me alone. No such luck. Almost stumbling over a root, I dropped my small bag and tried to run faster. Surely, I thought, if I could run for long enough, someone would come after me and help, right? But the cold truth was that no one knew I was out here, running for my life.

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'Secrets' sorta tied in - did you see? No? Try squinting.

Thanks for reading, and please review!


	16. PARADISE

**A/N: **Here's another cheery one for you all (such a rip-off that sarcasm doesn't come across over the internet) :P

**Sixteenth word: **_Paradise _

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**Gavner Purl**

I kept waiting to feel the piercing sting of the knife as I watched it impale my stomach, but it never came. Everything was in slow-motion, and it felt as though I was watching the scene from a distance. I was stabbed - Kurda had stabbed me. I was going to die. I barely noticed as I collapsed onto the floor.

So this was how it ended. I had often wondered if there was a vampire paradise. Now, I supposed, I would find out. As my vision began to fade, I went back to a time when I was young, and my mentor explained, what was at least his perception of, life after death. _"Live your life as something to be proud of, Gavner" _he had told me. "_Life is not about the final destination; do not go through life as a good man just to reach paradise. Life is about getting to the end and knowing that you can be happy with what you've done. And if you make it to the end without guilt and regret, why should anything wrong? There will be nothing to fear."_

Somewhere in the distance - or maybe it was very nearby, I had lost my sense of space and time - I heard a startled cry; Darren. I felt my slowing heart jump, hoping that the boy wouldn't be next. As I felt him crouch next to me, my mind returned to my mentor, as though he were somewhere nearby, waiting and directing me on what to think and how to feel as I took my last breaths. My mentor was the closest thing to a parent I could remember, and every word he said, I had clung onto and believed. Of course I had had made my fair share of mistakes, but I always tried my very best to make up for them. Another one of the things he often said, _"There is nothing that you have done wrong that can't be made right with determination, strength of heart, and a good apology."_

Was there anything left for me to make right anymore? There was nothing serious that I regretted now as I faced the end, and just the thought made my body feel lighter, as if I were being raised up and was leaving all the weight of life behind. There was only one thing I could think of that I regretted, and it's insignificance almost made me smile, but I didn't think my face moved. I gave a cough, wanting my last words to right my final guilt.

"Suh..suh..sorry if muh...muh...my snoring kept you awake."

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**Arra Sails**

Since I was young, I had known how I wanted to die. It would be during a fight, a long, drawn-out battle, and I would have defeated as many opponents as possible before the instantly-killing blow struck. It would come from behind me, I wouldn't see it coming, and would be dead before I even knew what happened to me. That would be quick, easy, and honorable.

What I never wanted was to be laying on a bed in the mountain's infirmary, medics fussing over me, while I struggled to keep my face straight against the pain that was no longer contained to the wound in my stomach. I had been told dying wouldn't hurt. Whoever said that obviously hadn't died.

This wasn't how I wanted it. I had wanted no drama, no struggle to live, no last words. Now, I was getting all three.

Larten was next to me, his hand wrapped around mine, as he whispered something I couldn't hear. Tears were dripping down his face and onto my hand, and his jaw was trembling. I could feel a burn shoot through my body as someone pulled a blood-saturated bandage off my stomach and replaced it with another, and I whimpered. I hated whimpering. Humans whimpered; it was a sign of weakness.

After a while, I stopped fighting to keep my eyes opened. When I tried to relax, I was able to make out some of Larten's stuttered words. "Keep fighting, Arra," he choked out. "You'll be okay." He was contracting his words together, a sign that I must really be looking done for. My brain slipped in and out of total awareness, but as it went back briefly to what it had been an hour ago, my eyes snapped open. I did have a reason to live, even if just to say my piece. And here we went with the last words.

"Larten," I said. I meant it to sound strong and urgent, but my voice was faint, and I wondered whether or not he could actually hear it. Slowly, I felt his arms wrap behind me and he lifted my back slightly, so I was leaning against his chest. I would have thought sitting up would hurt, but somehow, his embrace made me feel better. "Larten," I said again, and now I saw him lower his ear towards my mouth to hear what I was saying. "Don't l..let them k...kill him. He des...erves to live. He n...needs to. Tell the P...princes."

He murmured something about me telling them myself; he was denying my inevitable death far more than I was. I felt his lips press to mine, and my eyes fell shut again as I tried to return it. "I l...love you," he whispered into my hair, and a slight smile forced itself onto my face. Maybe dying in the arms of the man I love wasn't the worst way to go after all.

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**Kurda Smahlt**

"If you could go back and change what you did now, would you?"

I stared at Paris Skyle as he tied the last constraint to my ankles and straightened up. His voice was quiet; we were standing on the platform above the Hall of Execution. The rope was tied already to the top of the cage I was strapped into, and in a matter of moments, I would be lifted the last several feet into the air, before being left to plummet into the stakes below. I had seen it so many times before, had heard the screams as the first stakes pierced the offender's body, and listened as their lungs and throat were finally punctured through, and they could no longer cry out audibly.

Paris had volunteered to tie me in - though Arrow and Mika had both wanted a part in the job of killing the filthy little traitor, Paris, as the senior of them both, had insisted that it would be his job. I had wondered why at first, since he had never been especially partial to the brutal punishments and heartless execution of our kind, but now I knew.

"Kurda?" he said again, his voice still soft and patient. It hadn't been a rhetorical question for me the think over while I was impaled by stakes, he wanted an answer.

With my own two hands, I had killed one of my closest friends. How many others died at the hands of the vampaneze I had brought to the mountain? They had given me the number during my trial, though I couldn't remember it now. It had been too many - more than I had ever in my worst nightmares imagined.

But the vampires had also killed every vampaneze they came across, and that was an equally scary number. Of course, neither side had any regard for the other's losses. Yet neither could see outside the box; that there were ways other than fighting. In a fight, one side always won. If there was peace, both would be victorious.

Paris still watched me, his eyebrows raised as he waited for my answer. Meeting his gaze, I slowly shook my head. "No," I said quietly. "I wouldn't."

He nodded, expression unchanged. "Very well. I am sorry you will never stand beside me in the Hall of Princes." He made the death's touch sign as he backed to the stairs that would bring him down to ground level. "Even in death may you be triumphant."

And without a minute's hesitation, I felt the jerk of a rope on the top of my cage as I ascended the last twenty feet in the air. I hung there, suspended above the hall for a split second, hearing the cheers and shouts of the vampires bellow. I squeezed my eyes shut and made my peace with the vampire gods. Then, I dropped.

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I was going to go through every vampire that died during the series (not _every _vampire, but all the ones we knew), but decided to stop after these three. Why these three? They were the ones I didn't get stumped on, haha! Anyhow, thanks for reading!

**NOW WAIT!** Before you go to review (which I'm sure you'll _all _do because you're all so awesome ;D), I have a question for you that's going to impact what I write for one of my final entries. How many of you know how to play the party card game 'Mafia' (or 'Werewolf' or 'Assassin')? Everybody let me know, I don't want to write something no one's going to understand! Thank you!


	17. METAL

**A/N: **After the best and craziest week of my life, I am back and ready to start wrapping up this contest! Number seventeen, whoop! :D To be completely honest, I was panicking about this word for the longest time. 'Metal' just seemed really hard to come up with something for. It kind of was, but I think I came up with something different from what I usually write, and it's another character I've never written before, so all in all, not so bad :)

**Seventeenth word: **_M__etal_

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Betrayed. Deceived. Alone. That was how I felt. And by Darren, no less. I thought he was my friend. I thought he was my only friend. Obviously, I had been wrong.

It had been nearly a month since Darren had 'died'. Nearly a month since he had shown his true colors and run away with Vur Horsten and taken the life I had always wanted.

I stumbled home from school and slammed the door, throwing my stuff down and nearly breaking a small hallway table.

"Watch it," my mom grumbled from the den. I could hear the thick tone of her voice that meant she'd been drinking. "And bring your stuff upstairs. Rob's coming over tonight."

I gave a disgusted hack loud enough for her to hear - she knew I hated her boyfriend every bit as much as he hated me. I hauled my backpack up to my room, kicked the door shut behind me and chucked myself on the bed. It was a familiar routine.

I felt the burn starting to sizzle up from my gut and into my chest, felt my throat tighten as I felt like I was going to be sick, felt my eyes start to burn with bitter tears. Biting hard into my bottom lip, I yanked the glove off my hand and stared at the cross I had etched into it. It had almost entirely healed over now. My mom had seen it, freaked, and made me get stitches. The doctor had promised it would barely leave a scar. I had tried to rip the nasty stitches out, but I had lost the strength of mind to do even that. I felt so weak and insignificant, and I hated it. I wanted to be a different person, a stronger person. I wanted to be a vampire. But instead, here I was, same old Steve, in the same old life, while Darren, who had had anything he had ever wanted, got what I deserved.

I could hear the doorbell downstairs and pressed the pillow over my head so I wouldn't have to hear Rob's dumbass voice as he greeted my mom. I waited five minutes, then slowly lifted the pillow. I groaned; I could still hear him. They almost always went out if I was home, sometimes for a couple hours, sometimes for a night or two, and neither would bother to leave me so much as a note either way. It hurt when I was younger, even though the boyfriend then wasn't as much of a jerk as Rob, and I had hated being left alone. Sometimes I'd go to Darren's house for the night, and his parents always seemed to know that something was up. They never asked to call my mom to ask if I could stay for dinner or sleep over. It was like they knew. They were good people. I gave a bitter snort - Darren had screwed up their lives too. Bastard.

I slipped a pocketknife out of my bedside table and flipped it open. It was shiny and firm, with not one mark on its silver surface. I used the sharp tip to gently trace along the cross on my hand as I thought of Darren and that good-for-nothing vampire Vur Horsten, or Larten Crepsley - whatever he went by now. The knife left a trailing white scratch in its wake.

As I felt the red-hot anger bubbling up from my stomach, I pushed the knife harder until I felt it rip into the flesh of my palm. I clenched my teeth as the burn rippled up my arm and into my chest. The sting of the knife was taking the ache and misery away. I lifted the strong metal blade then brought it down again in the other direction, cutting perpendicular to the slice I had already made, re-opening the cross. I threw the knife to the side and made a tight fist, the tips of my fingers digging into the raw nerves and tendons in my palm. My blood - my filthy, evil blood Crepsley had refused - seeped through my fingers and down my wrist. I watched it, jaw set, my eyes determinedly dry, unwavering and strong like the metal of the blade. I wasn't going to be weak anymore.

Maybe that vow did mean something after all. This was all Darren and Creepy Crepsley's fault, and they would pay.

When I woke up this morning, I had wanted to die. But weak people died. Tonight, I knew what the strong, never-breaking me wanted. I wanted to kill.

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I know, that was dark and insanely short. But I promise a happy, fluffy, cute something for next time that will make you smile :) So please, read and review, and hopefully I'll get eighteen up soon!


	18. DANCING

**A/N: **Well, I promised something cute and fluffy and here you go! I personally think it's a little too mushy, but it included 'Dancing' and that was all I could ask for XD So, enjoy!

**Eighteenth word: **_Dancing_

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"The night's getting old. You gonna ask her or what?"

Larten had been sitting in a corner of the hall the entire night, letting the Festival of the Undead pass him by while he sweat in the corner, debating the question of the century: to ask or not to ask the girl to dance. He had been waiting for the this night for a year, knowing that this was exactly how he was going to tell Arra how he had felt about her for the last, well, lifetime. The moment was here. The hall was full of the laughter of joyous vampires, an ancient General was playing a tune on a violin that I suspected had been passed down from his grandmother's great uncle, the lights were dim, and almost everyone was drunk. There was no better time to ask, and yet he still sat. I was beginning to get annoyed.

"I...I do not know, Gavner" he said, and I groaned. "I am too afraid that she will say no and I will look like a fool."

"She's not going to say no," I rolled my eyes. "I told you, she likes you just as much as you like her. Everyone knows it, except apparently you." I grabbed his shoulders and yanked him to his feet. "Now," I said forcefully, "ask her to dance within the next five minutes, or I'm going to ask her and make you so jealous that you'll want to knock my lights out." I'd had a fair amount to drink, and Arra did look very pretty tonight; it wouldn't be hard.

Larten stared at me for a moment, then smiled, nodding. "You are right, I should not drag my feet. Thank you."

I shrugged and slapped him on the back. "What are friends for?"

As he began maneuvering his way through the throng of vampires, I had a sudden moment of panic and called him back. "Larten, wait!"

Larten turned, eyebrows raised. "Seconds ago you told me to hurry, now you tell me to wait. I think you have had a little too much to drink, my friend."

I grinned. "Well, I can't send you on your way without a little pep talk. Now, listen carefully." I beckoned him closer and he came up next to me, eager for any last-minute advice I was willing to offer. "Relax. Take a deep breath before you ask her. Try to be fun and positive. Smile, mate, I've seen corpses with happier expressions." I was about to send him off again, then realized I'd left out the most important tip of all. "_Don't_," I stressed the word, "correct her speech if she isn't speaking good."

"Speaking 'well'," Larten corrected with a smirk, and I kicked his shin.

"That was a test, idiot, and you just failed" I snapped.

He winced. "I was just joking." Then he sighed. "Wish me luck."

I sighed and smiled after him, watching as he slowly made his way to Arra, who was standing near the far wall talking to Vanez. I watched, contemplating whether or not to cover my eyes, as he shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. Larten and Arra had been friends almost as long as Larten and I had, and they'd wanted to be more since they'd first me. Yet there was Larten, wringing his hands, a large, dark, sweaty spot down the back of his blood-red robes. Over the years, both had confided their feelings in me, and I had given my every suggestion to stop dragging their feet, yet neither believed me when I told them there was nothing to be afraid of. Typical. They were both so stubborn, so thick headed, so...frustrating. They were so perfect for each other.

I couldn't help but grin like a child when I saw Arra nod and follow Larten onto the dance floor. I could have sung with glee as they started dancing. For nearly a full minute, they danced across the floor, albeit a bit clumsily - Larten had unusually large feet. And then, they stopped. Just stopped. Larten held up a finger, Arra smiled and nodded, and he began walking away. What the hell was he doing? I hadn't thought it necessary to include 'and don't flaming walk away in the middle' in my pep talk; that, I though, was common sense, even to Larten.

"What's the matter with you?" I snapped, turning so Arra wouldn't see me glaring at him.

His cheeks were bright red, and his shoulders slumped as he whispered, "I cannot tell her. I asked her to dance, but what if she thinks it is as friends? I always pictured something happening; I thought she would just know and be the one to say something. I have absolutely no idea what I am doing."

"She knows!" I hissed between my clenched teeth. "Look at how red her face got when you asked her!"

"Perhaps she is overheating," Larten said, pulling at his collar as sweat rolled down his neck. "It is abnormally hot in he-"

"Larten!" I barked, and he stopped. "I would bet every possession I have to my name that you were bright red, spluttering, and bumbling over your words when you asked her to dance. Trust me. She. Knows."

"But we are friends!" he countered. "Why would she think it has changed now?"

"Look at yourself!" I cried. "Larten Crepsley, who can pick raw meat from his teeth with dignity, is falling apart." He gave a brief, sheepish smile, then shook his head again. I sighed, "Well, if you still don't think she knows, make a move. Do something a little bold!"

He thought for a minute. "You are right," he finally nodded slowly. "I will offer to get her a drink."

I roared with frustration. "A drink? Give her a bloody kiss you moron!"

"A kiss?" he said weakly. "A kiss? Are you insane? That is rushing things!"

"Larten," I said slowly, as though speaking to someone very dull - I was beginning to think that I was, "I didn't tell you to get in bed with her." His face was beyond red now. "I told you to kiss her. Kiss her! Kiss the bottom of her foot for all I care, just please, do something. Every second you waste here is precious time you could be spending with her. Go!"

"What if she does not feel the same way?" he fretted. "Or what if she does and she thinks it is entirely over the line? I could ruin everything."

"What's the worst that could happen?" I asked, sitting down and massaging my temples. I could feel a full-on migraine threatening to explode inside my skull.

"The worst that could happen?" he said incredulously. "This is Arra Sails! She could cut me in half with a spoon and strangle me with my dismembered legs!"

I could see Arra approaching as he continued. I smiled at her, though he was oblivious. "...set my cold, dead body on fire..." he was ranting, biting at each of his fingernails. Arra was nearly behind him now, her eyebrows raised as he concluded with, "… the charred pieces to a lion!"

"What is this?" she asked calmly, and he jumped around.

"Nothing," I told her, fighting to keep myself from bursting with laughter. "Larten's just being stupid. You two get back to your dance, you looked like you were having a good time."

She smiled and nodded, "We were. Come on, Larten, let's go."

As he returned to the dance floor after giving me one panicked glare, I folded my arms and leaned back, grinning from ear to ear. What Larten didn't know about tonight was that Arra already knew exactly what he was going to tell her. I'd told her a week ago. I didn't see it as betraying Larten's trust. He'd never specified that I couldn't tell her, and I looked at it as a favor to both of my best friends. I knew he would probably never muster the courage to tell her, and I knew she liked to be prepared. And of course, now I also knew that things would work out perfectly for them, and I could give Larten the go-ahead to be a little daring. It was win-win this way.

They danced song after song, and I started tapping my foot, wishing something would happen. I probably should have clarified in my wish that something _good_ would happen.

I thought for a second that maybe he was going to do something. It looked like he was going to lean in to kiss her, but a second look showed me that he had just tripped over – what else – his own feet. I stood up just in time to see him tumbling onto the ground, pulling Arra with him.

A couple vampires turned, but for the most part, no one noticed or cared. That was, no one except Larten. His face matched his robes as he helped Arra to her feet. Though she was smiling, he was apologizing repeatedly, straightening her dress and asking if she was okay.

"Oh, Larten," she laughed, then, to my surprise and utmost relief, she stood on her toes and kissed him. "I don't think dancing is your thing."

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Told you it got sickeningly soppy, especially at the end there, hehe. Anyhow, thanks for reading - I'll let you go and review now :D


	19. SERIOUS

**A/N: **So here I was, all ready to make another fluffy, happy fic, started writing it, failed, and came up with this, which isn't at all fluffy or happy. Ah well, this is probably the last new character I'm going to squeeze into this contest, so I'll be happy about that :) Enjoy!

**Nineteenth ****word: **_Serious_

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"Annie? Honey, are you awake yet?"

Annie didn't answer her mother though she was awake and had been for hours. She sighed and rolled onto her side, clutching her blankets tightly in her hands. The door creaked open and she heard the footsteps coming closer to her bed. Finally, her mother appeared, kneeling in front of her and giving her a small smile that Annie could read through. Angela Shan's hand reached up to stroke the hair off Annie's face. "Why don't you come downstairs?" she asked softly. "You can have some breakfast."

"I'm not hungry," Annie said, turning away from her mother and staring up at the ceiling.

Angela sighed and sat at the edge of the bed. "You should have something. Maybe just a little toast?"

"I'm not hungry," Annie repeated, though she sat up and brought her knees to her chest, looking blankly at the yellow wall across from her. She could feel her mother's hand on her back, gently pulling her into a one-armed hug.

"That's okay," she said. "You don't have to eat if you don't want to. But why don't you come downstairs? Dad was going to go to the bank in a few minutes, and you know he passes by the bakery on his way home. If you go with him, I bet he'd get you something."

Annie shook her head, her chin resting on her forearms. "I'm tired."

Angela sighed and patted her on the back. Annie, the little girl who had loved to laugh, always used to smile, could make everyone happy with her glow, had turned into a sullen, serious girl who carried the emotional weight of a woman ten times her since they lost Darren six months ago. Angela felt like she'd lost her daughter almost as much as her son. It killed her to see the twinkle gone from her little girl's eyes, most of all because she knew Annie was a reflection of her herself."Okay," she said, standing and giving her a kiss on the forehead. "You can stay in bed for a bit. How about I get you your dolls?"

Annie gave a small shrug and slid back under her light blue covers, pulling them up to her chin though it was summertime and hot out. Her mother bent down and opened the large trunk that sat at the foot of Annie's bed - her toy box. Fishing around inside, she knew exactly what to look for. Annie's two favorite dolls had been gifts from her grandmother when she turned two. They were soft and small, a brother and sister pair that Annie had cherished since the first day she'd looked into their black button eyes.

When Angela felt her hand close around a yarn braid, she smiled, gently pulling little Audrey out of the toy box and setting her on the end of Annie's bed while she looked for little Joey to finish the set; one was never without the other.

She searched for several more minutes, pulling other toys out of the box and laying them on the floor to try and find him. After removing every other toy, she frowned and sighed, folding her arms. "I'm sorry, sweetie, I can't find him," she said, looking up at Annie, who had scooped up little Audrey and was hugging her to her chest. When Annie didn't make any indication that she had heard her, she asked, "Do you know where he is?" Still no answer. It was strange, Annie always kept her toys together and neat; never, even as a little girl, had she lost track of where each of her beloved dolls or stuffed animals were at any given moment. "Annie?"

Annie looked up at her mother. "Who?"

"Joey."

When Annie just blinked, she added, "The other doll. Audrey's brother. Do you know -?" She stopped halfway through her sentence as realization hit her and she felt her chest tighten. She inhaled sharply as Annie turned her face back into her pillow.

"He's gone," Annie whispered as her mother scooped her into her arms, feeling her own tears drip into her daughter's hair. "I lost him," her voice was small as her mother squeezed her to her chest. "Forever."

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I'm getting to the end of the contest, so what better time to review than right here, right now? Thanks for reading!


	20. CLOSER

**A/N:**Well, whattaya know, here I am, number twenty of a twenty word contest! I'm feeling insanely proud of myself right now :D Damn bonus word *grumbles*...

Anyhow, on a more serious note, I'm dedicating this chapter to my friend's grandma, who passed away a couple months back. If it weren't for all her wonderful stories, I never would have had this idea. Thanks, Mrs. F., for making me spook-minded :)

Uh...let's see, what else? This is also partially inspired by the beautiful song Hello by _Evanescence_. And because I have some flashback-like parts, the tenses seem sort of screwy, and I totally confused myself trying to fix them, so they might still be, so sorry about that. And this is set somewhere around books 7-9. Enjoy!

**Twentieth**(eek!) **word: **_Closer_

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It was hours before sundown when Larten was awakened. He shifted slightly as he felt the gentle hand on his cheek, but kept his eyes squeezed tightly shut; he was afraid he'd lose the feeling if he didn't. He didn't bother to see if it was Darren, or Vancha, or Harkat, he knew it wasn't any of them.

In the beginning, every time he had been awakened, he'd sat up and stared frantically around at his fellow hunters, or any living thing, to see who had touched him, or whispered something incomprehensible. But it had never been them.

Over time, everything had become stronger. What started as a gentle brush had turned into a trace of fingers over his chest, or a pat on the back. Small inhales had become all-out sniffles. The murmuring went on for weeks before becoming recognizable. He had never been quite sure if they - the voices - were talking to him, amongst themselves, or to no one but the wind. And on the day when he suddenly recognized one voice, it made his heart freeze in his chest. His eyes sprung open and this time, he thought that he would for sure see the speaker. He thought that knowing what to look for would make the difference - he was looking for no living being. Nearly jumping to his feet, he saw...nothing. No one was there. He fell back to the ground; of course he couldn't see anything. Gavner was dead. He had only heard him through his imagination.

But the following night, when he had felt the hand - not Gavner's - it was a soft, caressing hand - laying on his stomach, it had felt so real. He had tried to trap it against him before opening his eyes, determined not to let Arra - no, not Arra, he had forced himself to remember, it was a figment of her all from his mind - slip away. But the moment he tried to touch the hand, the sensation was gone. His eyes had opened, and once again, there was no one there.

As time went on, these...phenomenons - he didn't know what else to call them - expanded from awakening him during the day to startling him at night. He never shared these sounds or feelings with Vancha, Harkat, or even Darren. They would laugh at him for hearing voices that weren't there and tell him he was probably bumping into branches or the like. Even if they didn't disregard it, something told him they wouldn't understand. And that realization began to help him form a theory. A theory of why he could feel Arra's hand in his, why he could hear her soft whispers in his ear, and why Gavner's sniffling and chuckling seemed to join him wherever he went. They weren't figments of his mind. They weren't illusions from his heart. They were ghosts.

It seemed like such a silly idea. Larten Crepsley didn't believe in ghosts. But what else could it be? And slowly the reason for their sudden appearance began to dawn on him. And that reason didn't scare him as much as he'd have thought it would.

As the months went on, Larten didn't dare open his eyes or look around anymore when he heard or felt something, fearing that it would make them go away. Over time everything was sounding more clear, and feeling more and more real. Sometimes it almost felt like he could speak with them, and it made him feel whole again to feel the presence of those he had loved. He wondered if it was all in his head, and wondered if that meant it wasn't real. He hoped not. In some ways he felt like it was the light at the end of a very long, very difficult tunnel.

And this particular day, he was awakened from his spot on the cold, hard ground with a tickle of fingertips across his chin and it suddenly seemed too real, and he knew that meant it couldn't be much longer now. Right now seemed like he was nearer to them than ever before, and he had to take the chance to see them. Leap, he remembered the axiom going, and the net will appear.

He opened his eyes...and felt his ancient heart jump a couple beats. There she was, lying beside him, smiling as she stroked along his jaw. She wasn't white, or shining, or transparent, as ghosts were always thought to be, but he could tell. She didn't look entirely like the Arra he used to know; she looked happier, more at peace. And he slowly wiped a tear out of the corner of his eye, so happy to see her but so afraid she would disappear at the same time. Behind her was Gavner, sitting on a fallen tree, his face as serene as Arra's. Larten took a shaking breath as he looked from Gavner's familiar smile into Arra's eyes; the storminess had turned to a lighter, brighter grey-tinged blue. He dared to reach out and rest a hand on the side of her face. His heart longed to touch her with his own two hands, but she gently shook her head and pulled it away.

"Soon," she said softly, her voice fading out into the day's cool breeze, and he could see Gavner nod sadly in the background.

Larten nodded, and though it made his tired old heart's thumping feel labored, it made him smile - he had known for a while. He let his eyes fall closed again, afraid that watching them for too long would make them vanish into thin air the same way Arra's whisper that he would soon be fully with them again had.

It was closer now, and he would welcome it.

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Well, there you have it, word twenty! So, I hope you enjoyed it, please review (this is it, your second-to-last chance!) to let me know what you thought! Thanks for reading! :)


	21. Bonus Word: FAMILY

**A/N: **Ta-da! Bonus word number twenty-one, last word for this contest, done and done :D YAY! It's really short, but who said the longer the better? So, thank you so much to all who've read and reviewed (this is it, the real last one, you can find it in the kindness of your hearts to review just one more time - or, better yet, the first time - for this!)!

Also, I'm not sure that I'm going to leave this whole thing up forever, but would probably repost any chapter I or anyone else really liked, so if any of you liked one in particular/if you had a favorite/really hate one and want it blown off the face of the earth, please let me know :D

**Twentieth bonus word: **_Family _

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_I winced as the cool, scratchy cloth ran over the raw skin on my shoulders. My head couldn't process where I was, why my skin stung, and why my throat and lungs felt dry and chapped. Slowly opening my eyes, I squinted into my cot and could feel my head pounding against my ears as my mind began to gradually clear. For a moment, while the memories of my last trial came back to me bit by bit, I could almost still see the flames billowing in front of my eyes. I clenched them shut and tried to drive away the feeling that I was still in the the fiery hell on earth.

Once the raging heat inside my head had passed, I tried to roll onto my side, groaning slightly as I felt my skin crackle and split.

"Easy," a deep voice said soothingly, and a gentle hand turned me onto my stomach again.

The hand began to apply a cool ointment onto my burned back and I turned my head, still confused but wanting to see who it was. My vision had been reduced to seeing smoky shadows, and I couldn't make out the man sitting beside me at first. I blinked my eyes several times, trying to clear the haze. My brain couldn't work fast enough to think of who it could be; I knew I had been in the Hall of Flames, and I knew it was because I was taking my trials, but I couldn't remember why I was taking trials (or even what the trails actually were), where I was, or even specifically who I was. I was Darren, I knew that...but that was all.

Slowly, some of the fogginess lifted from my eyes, and I could make out the man next to me. I recognized him, but still couldn't place exactly who he was. He looked down at me, smiling, and wiped at my face with the cool cloth. When he pulled it away, there were streaks of black ash on it. I realized what bad shape I must have been in - and still was in - after the trial; this man, whoever he was, was taking care of me. I shifted painfully again on my cot, only coming up with one man who it could be.

"Dad?" I tried to ask, but my lips moved soundlessly. My voice was gone.

The man obviously couldn't make out what I had tried to say. He smiled again. "It is all right, Darren" he said, and the more I heard his voice, the more I recognized him for who he really was. Then everything - where I was, who he was, who I was - began to come back to me. "The trial is over," he said softly. "You made it."

I tried to force a grateful smile onto my face for my mentor, though for the first time in years I found myself missing my dad, and my mom and sister too, terribly.

"Gavner is here," Mr. Crepsley said, patting the palm of my left hand - the only part of me that wasn't burnt and bleeding. "Harkat and Arra were here as well."

"You did a wonderful job," Gavner's voice said from the other side of my cot. "We're all very proud of you."

The smile finally spread on my lips. I missed my old family, but I had a new family now, and they cared about me just as much.

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Done :)


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